GIFT   OF 
W-    E.  .    H  ftyvvvjUov\. 


STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 


STUDIES  IN  MORAL 
SCIENCE 


BY 
W.  E.  HAMILTON 

PROFESSOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY  EMERITUS 
IN  SIMPSON  COLLEGE 


CHICAGO 

PRINTED  FOR  THE  AUTHOR 
1916 


Copyright,  1916. 

BY  W.  E.  HAMILTON 

Indianaola,  Iowa 


CTfje  ILafcfsttie 

R.  R.  DONNELLEY  &  SONS  COMPANY 
CHICAGO 


TO 

MY  STUDENTS 

WHOSE    EARNEST    AND    SYMPATHETIC    ATTENTION 
IS    GRATEFULLY    ACKNOWLEDGED, 

THESE    PAGES 
ARE    AFFECTIONATELY    DEDICATED 


PREFACE 

STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE  is  published  in  response  to  the 
expressed  desire  of  many  of  the  author's  students  that  the  lec- 
tures which  had  formed  the  basis  of  class  room  discussions  for 
so  many  years  might  be  preserved  in  permanent  form. 

The  lectures  have  been  rewritten  and  an  effort  has  been 
made  to  prepare  the  work  for  the  general  reader. 

It  would  seem  presumptuous  to  hope  that  this  little  book 
might  "fill  a  long  felt  want"  for  a  textbook  which  would  give  a 
brief  discussion  of  the  problems  of  Moral  Science  and  be  adapted 
to  class  room  work.  But  should  any  teacher  find  here  any 
helpful  suggestions,  the  writer  will  be  amply  repaid  for  his 
pains  in  giving  the  work  to  the  world. 

The  attention  of  the  reader  is  especially  called  to  the  treat- 
ment of  Christian  Evidences.  To  some  it  may  seem  strange 
that  this  should  find  a  place  in  a  work  on  Ethics.  It  is  believed, 
however,  that  the  recognition  of  Moral  Dynamics  as  one  of  the 
divisions  of  Moral  Science  will  justify  the  attention  given  to 
that  faith,  which  has  been  the  greatest  Dynamic  for  righteous- 
ness that  the  world  has  ever  known.  It  is  hoped  that  this 
portion  of  the  work  may  be  helpful  to  those  religious  teachers 
who  are  called  to  answer  questions  as  to  the  grounds  of  Chris- 
tian belief. 

Grateful  acknowledgment  is  made  of  the  kindness  of  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  R.  S.  Beall  of  Mount  Ayr,  Iowa,  who  read  the  work  in 
manuscript  and  made  many  helpful  criticisms. 


CONTENTS 

BOOK  I  —  MORAL  THEORY  PAGE 

INTRODUCTION:  THE  FIELD  or  MORAL  SCIENCE     ....  n 

I.  THE  POSTULATES  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE 13 

II.  THE  DIVISIONS  or  MORAL  SCIENCE 15 

III.  WHAT  is  DUTY? 17 

IV.  MAN  A  MORAL  PERSON 21 

V.  PSYCHOLOGICAL  REVIEW 22 

VI.  THE  ELEMENTS  INVOLVED  IN  AN  EXERCISE  OF  THE  SEN- 

SIBILITIES        26 

VII.  THE  QUANTITY  AND  QUALITY  OF  THE  SENSIBILITIES      .     .  30 
VIII.  THE  INTELLECT  —  ITS  PLACE  IN  THE  MORAL  CONSCIOUSNESS  36 

IX.  THE  WILL 41 

X.  CONDITIONS  OF  CHOICE 48 

XI.  EFFECTS  OF  THE  EXERCISE  OF  WILL 52 

XII.  MORAL  GOOD 57 

XIII.  DISPOSITION  AND  CHARACTER 63 

XIV.  THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS 66 

XV.  THE  EXTERNAL  ACTIONS 75 

XVI.  THE  MORAL  FEELINGS 79 

XVII.  THE  CONSCIENCE >  83 

XVIII.  QUESTIONS  CONCERNING  CONSCIENCE 96 

XIX.  AUTHORITY  IN  MORALS 102 

BOOK  II  — PRACTICAL  ETHICS 

I.  INTRODUCTION 109 

II.  DIVISION  OF  DUTIES 114 

III.  DUTIES  TO  SELF 116 

IV.  DUTIES  TO  SELF  —  Continued 122 

THE  APPETITES 

V.  DUTIES  TO  SELF  —  Continued 132 

DUTIES  RELATING  TO  CHARACTER  —  THE  INTELLECT 

VI.  DUTIES  TO  SELF  —  Continued 138 

DUTIES  RELATING  TO  THE  EMOTIONS 

VII.  DUTIES  TO  SELF  —  Continued 141 

AMUSEMENTS 

VIII.  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  RIGHTS 152 

IX.  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  RIGHTS  —  Continued 161 

X.  DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  His  FELLOW  MAN 165 

XI.  DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  His  FELLOW  MAN — Continued      .  176 

XII.  DUTIES  TO  GOD 187 


io  CONTENTS 

BOOK  III  —  MORAL  DYNAMICS  PAGE 

I.  THE  GROWTH  OF  THE  IDEAL 197 

II.  THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MOTIVE 204 

III.  EXTRA  MORAL  FORCES  IN  MORAL  DEVELOPMENT    .     .     .  211 

IV.  EXTRA  MORAL  FORCES  —  Continued 214 

V.  EXTRA  MORAL  FORCES  —  Continued 218 

RELIGIOUS  FAITH 

VI.  WHY  EXAMINE  THE  EVIDENCES  OF  CHRISTIANITY?  .     .     .  225 

VII.  THE  NATURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  EVIDENCES 228 

VIII.  How  COULD  A  DIVINE  REVELATION,  IF  MADE,  BE  ACCREDITED?  231 
IX.  THE  PROPER  TEMPER  OF  MIND  IN  WHICH  TO  EXAMINE 

CHRISTIAN  EVIDENCES 234 

X.  THE  KIND  AND  DEGREE  OF  PROOF  WE  MAY  EXPECT  IN 

EVIDENCES  OF  CHRISTIANITY 237 

XI.  RIVAL  HYPOTHESES  AS  TO  THE  ORIGIN  OF  CHRISTIANITY     .  240 
XII.  THE  FOUNDER  OF  CHRISTIANITY  is  NOT  A  MYTHICAL  PER- 
SONAGE       242 

XIII.  WAS  THE  WHOLE  CHRISTIAN  CHURCH  AT  SOME  TIME  LEGEND- 

DUPED?    247 

XIV.  TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY  ' 252 

XV.  TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY  —  Continued      .     .     .  262 

XVI.  HYPOTHESIS  OF  LEGENDARY  GROWTH  —  Concluded  .     .     .  270 

XVII.  THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  FORGERY 272 

XVIII.  HYPOTHESIS  OF  DELUSION   OR  IMPOSTURE  —  PRELIMINARY 

SURVEY 279 

XIX.  WAS  JESUS  AN  IMPOSTOR  OR  A  MADMAN? 281 

XX.  WERE  THE  DISCIPLES  OF  JESUS  DELUDED  ENTHUSIASTS?   .  284 

XXI.  WERE  THE  APOSTLES  OF  JESUS  IMPOSTORS? 292 

CONCLUSION 298 


BOOK  I— MORAL  THEORY 

Introduction 
THE  FIELD  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE 

MORAL  SCIENCE  is  the  science  of  duty.  The  first  requisite  of 
any  science  or  of  any  department  of  a  science  is  the  existence 
of  some  well  defined  body  of  facts — a  group  of  objects  or  a 
succession  of  events  which  it  is  proposed  to  observe,  to  classify, 
or  to  explain.  Any  one  of  these  processes  of  observation, 
classification,  or  explanation  is  scientific;  and  the  merit  of  any 
treatment  of  a  given  subject  will  be  measured  by  the  accuracy 
of  the  observation,  the  logical  character  of  the  classification, 
and  the  rationality  of  the  explanation.  This  first  requisite  of 
a  science  we  have;  for  there  is  a  class  of  human  activities  to 
which  the  name  Duty  has  been  given.  This  is  the  field  of  Moral 
Science.  Every  fact  relating  to  the  things  which  men  any- 
where call  duty  has  a  place  for  treatment  in  any  comprehensive 
discussion  of  our  subject. 

It  has  sometimes  been  questioned  whether  a  Moral  Science 
is  possible.  It  is  said  that  there  is  so  little  agreement  among 
men  as  to  what  duty  is:  that  the  same  conduct  is  regarded  in 
one  community  as  a  duty  and  in  another  as  a  crime;  that  even 
the  same  person,  at  different  periods  in  life,  will  hold  as  duties, 
actions  most  diverse.  It  is  argued  that  in  this  confusion,  order 
and  system  and  hence  science  are  impossible.  Of  this  objec- 
tion several  things  are  to  be  noted: 

i.  It  argues  the  need  of  a  Moral  Science,  not  the  impossibil- 
ity of  it.  That  the  masses  of  men  have  widely  diverse  and  often 
crude  and  inconsistent  ideas  of  ethical  subjects  no  more  proves 
the  impossibility  of  a  Moral  Science  than  the  crude  notions  of 
the  ancients  respecting  a  multitude  of  physical  objects  would 
have  proven  the  impossibility  of  the  modern  sciences  of  Geog- 
raphy, Physics  and  Chemistry. 

ii 


12 


.STUDIES. Itf  MORAL  SCIENCE 


2 .  'Tne  objection  itself  •Kin  tsit  its  answer :  The  reality  of  duty 
may  be  found  to  lie,  not  in  the  substance  of  being,  not  in  the 
fact  of  given  actions  as  such,  but  in  the  relations  of  beings  and 
actions.     Some  other  sciences  are  as  open  to  objection  here  as 
that  with  which  we  are  at  present  concerned.    Ask  men  in 
different  climes  and  ages,  of  different  races  and  civilizations 
for  their  examples  of  the  beautiful,  and  you  will  have  diverse 
and  inconsistent  answers.     Yet  who  will  deny  the  existence  of 
the  Beautiful,  or  that  the  science  of  Aesthetics  is  in  some  meas- 
ure possible? 

3.  The  objection  concedes  one  of  the  principal  facts  with 
which  our  science   proposes    to   deal.    Notwithstanding   the 
diverse  opinions  of  men  as  to  the  concrete  actions  to  which  the 
name  duty  should  be  attached,  they  do  not  differ  as  to  the  ex- 
istence of  this  fact — that  some  relation  exists  between  them- 
selves and  their  fellows,  involving  discrimination  as  to  pro- 
prieties of  conduct.     In  any  emergency  some  one  action  is  the 
right  one,  and  its  opposite  is  wrong.     Men  do  not  differ  as  to 
there  being  a  right  and  a  wrong  action.     They  differ  as  to  what 
that   right  and  wrong  action  may  be.     Now   these   diverse 
opinions  are  facts  to  be  observed,  and  this  persistence  under  it 
all  of  the  universal  conviction  of  the  existence  of  duty  is  a  fact 
to  be  accounted  for.    This  leads  us  to  remark: 

4.  If  all  these  beliefs  of  men  are  incorrect  —  if  duty  is  a 
misnomer  and  right  and  wrong  are  fictions,  it  would  still  be  the 
function  of  some  science  to  show  that  fact  and  to  account  for 
these  delusions. 


STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

CHAPTER  I 
THE  POSTULATES  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE 

No  SCIENCE  really  begins  at  the  beginning.  Something  is 
always  assumed  as  known.  Some  things  will  be  taken  and 
accepted  without  proof.  No  better  illustration  of  this  can  be 
found  than  that  furnished  by  the  mathematical  sciences.  Every 
textbook  in  Algebra  or  Geometry  will  be  found  to  open  with 
the  statement  of  certain  axioms.  No  attempt  is  made  to  prove 
them.  They  are  incapable  of  proof.  Were  any  mind  so  con- 
stituted that  it  did  not  see  them,  were  any  one  to  question 
them  (their  import  being  comprehended),  even  then  it  would  be 
folly  to  attempt  to  prove  them.  If  any  man  does  not  see  that 
"the  whole  is  greater  than  any  of  its  parts,"  it  would  be  foolish 
to  try  to  teach  him  anything  either  of  Arithmetic  or  Geometry. 
Waste  no  time  with  him.  Science  does  not  exist  for  such 
minds  as  his.  All  physical  science,  too,  assumes  the  reality  of 
the  material  universe  and  of  the  knowing  mind.  In  our  treat- 
ment of  Moral  Science,  there  are  certain  things  which  we  shall 
assume.  We  may  explain  the  phraseology  of  the  propositions 
in  which  we  state  them;  the  truths  themselves  we  shall  not 
attempt  to  prove.  We  assume: 

1.  The  verity  of  the  universal  thought  conceptions.     We 
include  in  these  the  axioms  of  Mathematics  and  of  Logic,  and 
the  intuitions  of  the  understanding,  such  as  Space,  Time,  Sub- 
stance and  Attribute,  Causation  and  Final  Cause.    By  that 
last  term  we  mean  to  affirm  design  in  the  universe.    We  justify 
the  child's  eternal  question  of  "  What  for?  "  and  claim  that  things 
are  constituted  for  ends. 

2.  That  human  well  being  is  the  end  of  that  portion  of  the 
universe  which  is,  or  may  be  brought,  under  human  control. 

*      13 


14  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

This  is  not  set  forth  as  an  axiom.  It  is  not  necessarily  true; 
possibly  it  may  not  be  correct,  but  it  is  one  of  those  generali- 
zations which  "hold  the  field."  A  better  has  not  been  sug- 
gested. It  is  not  likely  to  be  disputed.  The  religious  moralist 
will  not  dare  to  question  it  for  he  is  accustomed  to  sing: 

"We  for  whose  sake  all  nature  stands 
And  stars  their  courses  move, 
We  for  whose  guard  the  angel  bands 
Come  flying  from  above. " 

Neither  the  infant  crying  for  the  moon,  the  devotee  of  sensual 
pleasure,  nor  the  greedy  seeker  of  gain  is  prepared  to  dispute  it, 
for  each  of  these  has  assumed  as  true  a  far  more  questionable 
proposition:  namely,  that  he  is  the  particidar  portion  of  the 
human  race  for  whom  all  things  exist.  We  have  worded  this 
postulate  carefully.  We  have  said  human  well  being,  so  that 
the  man  who  wishes  to  claim  anything  under  it  must  reconcile 
his  well  being  with  that  of  every  other  human.  We  have  not 
made  man  the  end  of  the  universe,  but  of  that  portion  of  it 
which  is  under  his  control.  And  we  claim  for  our  postulate, 
not  the  authority  of  an  intuition,  nor  even  of  a  demonstrated 
proposition,  but  simply  the  presumption  of  a  reasonable  "work- 
ing hypothesis."  Let  it  stand  until  some  one  in  good  faith 
questions  it. 

3.  The  absolute,  unimpeachable  authority  of  Conscious- 
ness: that  is,  of  the  power  of  the  soul  to  know  its  own  states. 
That  which  I  find  to  be  the  condition  of  my  own  self,  my  state 
of  action  or  of  suffering,  when  I  look  within,  that  thing  I  as- 
suredly know.  I  may  raise  a  question  as  to  what  I  see  or  hear, 
but  not  as  to  the  fact  that  /  do  see  and  hear.  I  may  be  in 
error  as  to  the  location  of  a  disorder  of  the  body,  but  if  I  have 
the  toothache,  I  can  not  question  that  I  do  suffer  pain. 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  DIVISIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE 

A  FEW  WORDS  are  in  place  here  as  to  the  divisions  of  our  sub- 
ject.   The  following  outline  is  suggested: 

Moral  Science  Proper  |  ^ 

f  Practical  Ethics 
Moral  Science     Ethks 

[  Casuistry 
Ethical  History 

Moral  Theory  or  Moral  Philosophy  is  primarily  and  chiefly 
a  study  of  the  moral  consciousness  of  the  individual  man.  In 
it  we  observe  and  study  all  those  powers  and  activities  which 
are  involved  in  those  experiences  which  we  call  moral.  In 
other  words,  we  consider  each  and  every  thing  in  the  constitu- 
tion and  development  of  man  which  contributes  to  the  making 
him  a  moral  person.  We  observe  the  growth  of  the  moral 
consciousness,  and  if  possible  account  for  it.  We  note  the 
effect  of  various  activities  on  the  moral  life.  We  seek  to  know 
if  possible  the  number  and  character  of  our  simple,  moral  ideas. 
We  search  for  the  ground  of  moral  obligation.  We  will  analyze 
and  discuss  the  various  theories  of  the  Conscience.  In  short, 
we  seek  to  answer  all  the  general  questions  which  may  ration- 
ally be  asked  about  that  which  men  call  Duty. 

Moral  Dynamics  will  treat  of  all  those  agencies  by  which 
the  actual  moral  life  of  an  individual  in  society  is  made  to  ap- 
_,  proach  the  ideal. 

Practical  Ethics  is  largely  a  classification  of  duties.  In  it 
we  enumerate  and  group  the  various  duties  of  man.  We  will 
formulate,  if  possible,  rules  for  the  direction  of  human  conduct. 
One  author  has  not  inappropriately  called  his  work,  in  the  con- 
sideration of  this  portion  of  our  subject,  a  treatise  on  "Rational 
Living. "  Very  clearly  much,  yes  most,  of  our  moral  instruction 

15 


16  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

is  in  this  domain.  The  family,  the  church  and  the  school  are 
more  concerned  with  rules  of  conduct  than  with  moral  theory. 
In  the  words  of  Prof essor Bowne,  "The moral  life  did  not  begin  in 
laying  down  general  principles  of  conduct,  but  in  forming  codes 
of  concrete  duties."  In  this  respect  our  moral  is  like  all  other 
departments  of  life.  As  children,  men  learn  first  in  the  con- 
crete. The  study  of  the  science  of  numbers  and  of  the  art  of 
computation  would  be  an  impossibility,  were  not  illustrations 
at  hand,  on  fingers,  balls,  apples  or  numeral  frame.  And  so 
although  we  begin  our  study  with  the  theory  of  morals,  that 
study  would  have  been  an  impossibility,  had  we  not,  in  the 
teaching  of  the  home  and  the  school,  perchance  of  the  play- 
ground and  the  street,  learned  somewhat  of  duty  in  the  concrete. 

Casuistry  seeks  to  make  out  rules  for  human  conduct,  in 
cases  of  supposedly  conflicting  duties.  At  one  time  it  engaged 
a  large  share  of  the  attention  of  moralists.  It  is  now  fallen 
into  bad  repute;  and  rightly  so,  for  its  very  existence  depended 
on  an  erroneous  conception  of  the  ground  of  moral  obligation. 
We  shall  see  that  there  can  be  no  cases  of  conflicting  duties. 

Ethical  History  will  review  the  moral  progress  of  the  race  or 
of  some  particular  portion  of  it.  It  will  note  the  rise  and  devel- 
opment of  various  ethical  systems,  and  the  prevalence  among 
men  of  various  ethical  notions.  It  is  inextricably  woven  into 
the  political  history  of  a  people.  It  has  been  well  said  that  the 
Law  of  a  nation  is  the  expression  of  the  collective  opinion  of 
that  people  as  to  what  right  is. 

We  shall  begin  our  study  with  Moral  Philosophy. 


CHAPTER  III 
WHAT  IS  DUTY? 

MORAL  SCIENCE  is  the  science  of  duty — but  what  is  duty?  The 
impossibility  of  specifying  any  one  set  of  external  activities,  to 
which  the  term  can  be  applied,  may  arise  from  the  fact  that  the 
"duty"  quality  of  any  act  lies  not  in  its  active  nature,  but  in 
its  relations.  Duty  in  the  concrete  is  the  act  that  ought  to  be 
done.  The  concept  Duty  in  its  extension  denotes  each  and 
every  act  which,  at  the  given  time  and  in  the  given  environ- 
ment, ought  to  be  done.  The  concept  Duty  in  its  intension 
denotes  this  one  mark  which  we  may  call  "oughtness. "  The 
one  distinguishing  feature  of  this  whole  class  of  activities,  to 
which  we  conceive  the  term  duty  to  be  applied,  is  this  quality 
of  "oughtness."  They  have  no  other  mark  in  common,  but 
this  they  do  have.  Each  and  every  one  of  them  has  "ought- 
ness,"  however  differing  in  other  respects.  There  is  scant 
resemblance  between  feeding  a  hungry  waif  and  administering 
the  penalty  of  the  law  upon  a  thief;  but  this  the  two  acts  do 
have  in  common,  each  one  is  something  which  ought  to  be  done. 

But  it  may  be  questioned  whether  this  definition  clears 
the  matter.  One  troublesome  word  has  been  defined  by  an- 
other of  no  less  difficulty.  "Oughtness"  is  as  difficult  of  defini- 
tion as  duty.  What  is  this  quality  of  "oughtness"?  Do  these 
terms,  duty— and  oughtness,  denote  a  simple  and  original  idea, 
which  defies  definition?  What  do  I  mean  when  I  say  that  this  or 
that  act  is  my  duty  or  that  I  ought  to  do  it?  Whether  or  not 
we  reach  a  more  adequate  definition,  it  may  help  us  to  an  under- 
standing of  the  subject  to  examine  those  circumstances  under 
which  men  are  accustomed  to  affirm  the  existence  of  duty. 
We  note: 

i.  There  is  a  subjective  and  an  objective  view  of  duty.  A 
man  affirms  that  a  given  act  is  his  duty  only  when  he  knows  him- 

17 


i8  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

self  the  subject  of  a  peculiar  psychical  experience — an  experience 
not  easily  described,  but  readily  understood  by  every  one  who 
has  had  it.  Let  no  one  think  it  strange  that  we  appeal  to 
experience  for  an  understanding  of  the  subjective  meaning  of 
duty.  A  like  appeal  must  be  made  in  the  effort  to  explicate 
any  psychical  fact.  One  can  only  discuss  color  intelligently 
with  those  who  discern  color,  and  by  appealing  to  their  expe- 
rience in  vision.  And  so  we  ask  the  reader  to  pause  here  long 
enough  to  recall  in  his  own  experience,  some  time  is  his  life, 
when  he  affirmed  that  some  act  was  his  duty.  Let  him  describe 
that  experience  if  he  can.  He  will  find  it  difficult,  but  one 
thing  is  certain:  there  was,  however  resisted  by  other  impulses, 
a  certain  drawing  or  pressure  toward  the  given  activity — a 
drawing,  not  always  of  inclination;  indeed  its  peculiar  nature 
is  best  observed,  when  inclination,  passion,  or  desire  have 
prompted  the  other  way.  In  some  cases  so  marked  has  this 
been  that  imaginative  persons  have  declared  that  they  heard 
voices  commanding  the  doing  of  the  act  in  question.  An  illu- 
sion, says  the  cool,  philosophical  critic.  Yes,  no  doubt.  But 
that  illusion  was  the  effect  on  a  highly  sensitive  nature  of  a 
peculiar  feeling,  which  is  the  experience  of  all;  a  certain  feeling 
like  no  other  to  which  the  soul  is  subject,  and  which  the  old 
philosophers,  using  metaphor  to  express  what  otherwise  could 
not  be  told  at  all,  called  a  sense  of  obligation.  Note  the  etymol- 
ogy— a  binding  to.  A  sense  of  obligation  then,  from  the  sub- 
jective side,  is  the  first  characteristic  of  the  experience  of  duty. 

But  taking  the  objective  view,  we  observe  that  the  action, 
which  is  said  to  be  duty  and  to  which  you  feel  obligated,  is 
always  conceived  as  possessing  certain  well  defined  character- 
istics. The  act  which  you  call  duty  is  always  thought  of  as  an 
advantageous  act;  not  always  advantageous  to  yourself  nor 
yet  to  the  being  most  immediately  acted  upon,  but  advantage- 
ous to  some  being.  No  one  ever  affirmed  a  wholly  malevo- 
lent act  or  an  indifferent  act  to  be  his  duty.  Advantage, 
beneficence  somewhere  in  the  universe  of  being,  is  objectively  a 
characteristic  of  duty. 

2.  Duty  is  affirmed  to  exist,  only  with  reference  to  sensitive 


WHAT  IS   DUTY?  19 

and  sentient  beings.  No  one  thinks  of  claiming  that  I  owe  a 
duty  to  a  stone  or  a  stump,  and  if  it  is  ever  said  that  I  owe  a 
duty  to  the  soil,  the  language  is  clearly  figurative.  It  is  only 
meant  that  I  am  obligated  to  use  it  in  a  certain  manner,  and 
to  refrain  from  using  it  in  another  manner,  because  of  the 
necessities  of  sentient  and  sensitive  beings,  who  now  or  in  the 
future  must  derive  their  sustenance  from  it.  My  duty  to  my 
country  is  not  to  its  mountains,  lakes,  or  rivers,  but  to  intelli- 
gent, sensitive  beings  like  myself,  who  do  now  or  will  live  in  it. 
Indeed,  more  than  one  sober  minded  citizen,  on  the  evening  of 
the  Fourth  of  July,  has  thought  that  we  would  be  better  off 
if  we  could  exchange  some  of  our  "love  of  our  country"  for  a 
little  more  kindly  consideration  of  our  countrymen. 

3.  Duty  is  charged  only  to  a  limited  and  peculiar  class  of 
beings.  As  no  duties  are  owed  to  inanimate  nature,  so  none  are 
demanded  of  it.  No  one  has  ever  thought  to  load  any  duty  on 
unintelligent  beings  and  forces.  It  is  clearly  figurative  language 
when  we  speak  of  the  hungry  flames,  the  cruel  flood,  or  the 
pitiless  storm.  Neither  do  we  affirm  duty  of  the  members  of 
the  brute  creation.  We  expect  service  from  them,  not  in  re- 
sponse to  a  moral  obligation  on  their  part,  but  by  virtue  of  our 
skill  to  require  and  enforce.  If  we  fail  to  receive  it,  we  are  morti- 
fied at  our  failure.  We  may  chastise  the  brute  to  make  him 
do  our  bidding,  but  not  his  duty.  There  was  profound  philos- 
ophy, as  well  as  "horse  sense, "  in  the  words  of  the  rustic  plough- 
man who  had  just  triumphantly  induced  the  balky  horse  of  a 
city  dude  to  go  on  his  way:  "You  see,  stranger,  it  is  just  like 
this:  if  the  man  knows  more  than  the  hoss,  he  can  manage  him; 
but  if  the  hoss^appens  to  know  the  most,  he  will  get  away  with 
the  man."  Further,  it  may  be  doubted  whether  any  but  chil- 
dren, before  observing  the  difference  between  human  and  brute 
intelligence,  are  accustomed  to  think  of  brutes  as  owing  duties 
to  each  other.  The  wolf  may  catch  the  hare  if  he  is  able;  the 
hare  may  get  out  of  the  way  if  he  can;  neither  one  owes  any  duty 
to  the  other.  Each  is  at  liberty,  without  regard  to  the  safety 
or  well  being  of  the  other,  to  manifest  and  realize,  to  the  full 
extent  of  his  power,  every  impulse  of  his  nature.  But  all  this 


20  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

changes  as  soon  as  we  turn  our  attention  to  human  society,  even 
the  rudest  and  most  primitive.  True,  man  may  and  often 
does  gorge  and  fight  and  lust  like  the  brute,  but  we  use  a  differ- 
ent set  of  terms  when  speaking  of  his  conduct.  That  which  in 
the  brute  was  only  the  necessary  manifestation  of  a  nature 
which  he  could  not  control,  and  so  is  viewed  by  us  as  a 
matter  of  course,  in  man  calls  for  our  scorn  or  contempt,  and 
receives  our  severest  condemnation.  We  hear  of  and  speak  of 
right  and  wrong,  of  good  and  evil,  of  praise  and  blame,  of  merit 
and  guilt,  of  virtue  and  vice.  And  we  hear  terms  like  these 
used  by  even  the  most  degraded  of  men.  We  have  entered 
the  moral  universe.  We  are  now  dealing  with  beings  possessing 
a  moral  consciousness. 

The  observations  of  the  last  few  paragraphs  are  so  generally 
received  and  believed  that  any  other  view  seems  absurd. 
Xerxes  by  flogging  the  Hellespont  makes  himself,  for  all  time,  an 
object  of  ridicule.  Why?  What  is  there  about  man,  that  of 
him,  and  of  him  alone  of  all  earthly  beings,  it  is  affirmed  that  he 
owes  duties?  What  are  the  endowments  which  constitute  man 
a  moral  person?  To  answer  these  questions  may  not  be  an 
easy  matter  but  it  must  be  done. 


CHAPTER  IV 

MAN  A  MORAL  PERSON 
Statement  of  Theories 

IN  answer  to  the  question,  What  constitutes  man  a  moral 
person?  two  opinions  have  been  advanced.  One  class  of  moral- 
ists would  have  us  believe  that  to  the  ordinary  faculties  of 
Intellect,  Sensibility  and  Will  there  has  been  added,  by  special 
creative  act,  an  additional  faculty  which  they  variously  term 
the  Moral  sense,  the  Moral  reason,  the  Spiritual  nature.  Others 
do  not  invent  any  such  faculty,  for  they  do  not  believe  it  neces- 
sary. They  hold  that  the  Moral  consciousness  results  from 
the  high  degree  to  which  man  is  able  to  exercise  his  universally 
recognized  powers  of  knowing,  feeling,  and  choosing;  that  each 
of  the  activities  which  we  call  moral  is  capable  of  being  resolved 
into  one  or  the  other,  or  a  combination  of  these.  They  hold 
that  the  scientific  law  of  parsimony,  which  forbids  the  assign- 
ment of  more  causes  than  are  necessary  to  account  for  the  phe- 
nomena, precludes  the  hypothesis  of  a  special  "moral  sense"; 
and  that  man's  "moral  nature"  designates  the  whole  of  his 
psychical  endowments  when  applied  to  a  special  subject 
matter;  that  man's  "moral  personality"  is  an  essential  and 
necessary  consequent  of  his  complete  and  developed  manhood, 
and  that  the  two  can  not  be  conceived  as  separable.  The 
question  is  not  one  for  argument,  but  for  careful  and  discrim- 
inating observation  of  the  moral  consciousness. 

We  would  not  at  this  stage  indicate  to  the  reader  the  doctrine 
of  this  treatise,  but  would  ask  him  to  be  with  us  an  investigator. 
Let  him  examine  the  part  which  the  ordinary  psychical  activi- 
ties perform  in  his  moral  experiences,  and  when  he  has  gone 
through  the  whole  range  of  his  moral  life,  and  set  out  what 
clearly  and  unquestionably  belongs  to  Intellect,  Sensibility, 
and  Will,  if  any  other,  and  different  activity,  remains,  then  let 
him  assign  it  to  a  "Special  Moral  Sense." 

21 


CHAPTER  V 
PSYCHOLOGICAL  REVIEW 

IN  speaking  of  the  " faculties"  of  the  soul  it  is  not  meant  that 
the  soul  is  divided  into  parts  or  organs  with  varying  functions. 
Faculties  are  only  powers  of  the  soul  for  specific  kinds  of  action. 
The  use  of  such  a  term  is  justified  by  the  fact  that  each  one's 
experience  assures  him  that  there  is  great  diversity  in  the  acts 
and  states  of  the  soul,  great  differences  considered  as  subjective 
experiences.  The  appellations  of  the  soul's  faculties  are  only 
names  of  the  several  classes  of  the  soul's  acts  and  states. 
The  best  definition  of  "faculty"  is  that  which  declares  it  to  be 
"the  soul  itself  in  some  one  of  its  distinguishable  forms  of  action 
or  suffering."  Thus  the  Intellect  is  "the  soul  endowed  with 
and  exercising  the  power  to  know. "  But  the  soul,  the  self,  the 
Ego,  does  other  things  besides  know.  The  same  "  I "  that  knows 
also  rejoices  in  that  knowing,  or  it  may  be  that  some  sort  of 
knowledge  gives  me  pain.  I  am  sure  that  I  am  the  subject  of 
both  activities;  that  the  knowing  is  different  from  the  rejoicing 
and  the  sorrowing;  that  these  last  two,  while  differing  in  quality, 
have  resemblances  justifying  their  being  grouped  together. 
Feeling,  whether  of  pleasure  or  pain,  is  something  essentially 
different  from  knowing.  The  Sensibility  is  defined  as  "the 
soul  endowed  with  and  exercising  the  power  to  feel."  Psy- 
chologists also  recognize  another  class  of  activities  still  different 
from  either  of  these,  and  have  defined  (somewhat  loosely  we 
think)  the  Will  as  the  "soul  endowed  with  and  exercising  the 
power  to  choose. " 

Most  important  for  our  purpose  at  this  time  is  the  consider- 
ation of  the  Sensibilities.  This  is  a  field  not  very  well  subjected 
to  scientific  treatment.  The  literature  is  meager  and  unsatis- 
factory as  compared  with  that  which  discusses  the  operations 
of  the  Intellect.  The  reason  is  not  hard  to  find.  The  expe- 

22 


PSYCHOLOGICAL  REVIEW  23 

riences  of  feeling  elude  investigation.  They  will  not  come  and 
go  at  our  command,  nor  abide  at  our  bidding.  While  acts  of 
knowing  may  be  repeated  as  often  as  desired,  it  is  impossible  to 
command  at  will  the  conditions  for  the  careful  study  of  the  most 
important  of  the  sensibilities.  Neither  the  lover  in  the  rapture 
of  betrothal,  the  parent  in  the  moments  of  yearning  for  his  child, 
the  widow  following  the  corpse  to  the  grave,  the  defeated  and 
panic  stricken  soldier  fleeing  from  the  field,  nor  the  man  in  a 
storm  of  angry  passions  is  at  all  qualified  to  make  scientific 
observations  on  himself.  If  he  attempt  it,  the  sensibility,  which 
he  would  study,  begins  to  vanish.  Those  feelings  which  need 
the  most  careful  study  are  those  in  which  self-consciousness  is 
feeble,  and  we  study  them  hours  afterwards  as  they  are  repro- 
duced in  memory.  We  may  reasonably  expect  that  the  attempt 
to  classify  the  sensibilities  will  yield  faulty  and  imperfect 
returns.  This  remark  applies  to  the  table  herewith  presented. 
The  author  believes  that  he  could  criticise  it  severely  himself, 
and  so  expects  the  reader  to  exercise  that  privilege.  Neverthe- 
less, he  believes  it  to  have  some  merits.  On  the  whole  it  is  the 
best  he  has  ever  seen,  and  he  presents  it  because,  for  the  pur- 
poses of  this  discussion,  it  promises  to  be  helpful. 

Each  of  these  divisions  has  some  characteristic  which  dis- 
tinguishes it  from  the  others.  Thus  it  is  characteristic  of  a 
sensation  that  while  it  is,  as  truly  as  any  other,  a  subjective 
experience  of  the  soul,  it  always  makes  prominent  the  fact  that 
it  is  of  the  soul  as  "animating  an  extended  sensorium,"  and 
that  it  is  "occasioned  by  some  affection  of  the  organism";  e.  g., 
I  extend  my  hand  and  apply  it  to  some  surface,  hot,  cold,  rough, 
or  smooth,  and  experience  the^  appropriate  sensation.  Now 
that  experience  is  as  truly  subjective,  that  is,  it  as  truly 
belongs  to  the  soul  as  any  I  can  have,  it  is  the  conscious  Ego 
which  feels  the  pain,  the  prick,  the  rough  or  the  smooth,  but  it 
is  not  the  Ego  as  pure  spirit.  In  this  experience  the  Ego  is 
made  aware  that  it  has  a  body,  and  that  a  part  of  that  body  is 
affected. 

The  Appetites  are  certain  cravings,  as  the  word  suggests, 
seekings  of  the  soul.  They  resemble  sensations,  in  that  they  are 


24 


STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 


Sensibilities 


f  Organic 
Sensations      Muscular 

[  Special 


Appetites 


Emotions 


Passions 


Sight 

Sound 

Dermal 

Taste 

Smell 


Senses 


Touch 
Pressure 
Weight 
Tickle 


Hunger 

Thirst 

Sleep 

Motion 

Rest 

Sex 


Egoistic  Feelings 


Altruistic  Feelings 


Aesthetic  Feelings 


Pious  Sentiments 


Moral  Feelings 


f  Hate 
Envy 
Jealousy 
Avarice 
Ambition,  etc. 


Joy 

Grief 

Fear 

Hope 

Love  of  Domination 

Love  of  Gain 

Love  of  Approval,  etc. 

Love 

Pity 

Sympathy 

Family  Affections 

Patriotism 

Social  Impulses 

Etc. 

Beauty 

Grandeur 

Sublimity 

Disgust 

Sense  of  Humor 

Etc. 

Awe 

Reverence 

Gratitude 

Penitence 

Obligation 

Self -approval 

Self-reproach 

Merit 

Demerit 


PSYCHOLOGICAL  REVIEW  25 

occasioned  by  conditions  of  the  organism.  Indeed  they  might, 
with  some  show  of  reason,  be  grouped  with  sensations  (for 
sensations  always  attend  them),  but  they  are  distinguished  from 
the  more  general  class  to  which  we  give  that  name  by  their 
function  in  the  economy  of  life.  Each  one  of  them  bears  a 
necessary  relation,  either  to  the  healthy  condition  of  the  body 
or  to  the  perpetuity  of  the  species. 

Emotions  and  Passions  have  much  in  common.  Indeed,  a 
passion  is  usually  an  emotion  which  has  become  a  permanent 
state  of  the  soul.  Hate,  which  we  call  a  passion,  seems  to  be 
only  a  permanent  state  of  being  angry.  They  are  distinguished 
from  the  other  great  classes  of  Sensibilities  by  the  character 
of  the  stimulus  by  which  they  are  excited.  This  will  be  noticed 
more  fully  hereafter.  As  it  is  the  aim  of  this  discussion  only  to 
make  such  a  study  of  the  Sensibilities  as  is  necessary  for  the 
study  of  the  moral  consciousness,  we  refrain  from  entering  upon 
an  extended  review  of  the  sub-classes  and  examples  enumerated. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  ELEMENTS  INVOLVED  IN  AN  EXERCISE  OF 
THE  SENSIBILITIES 

IF  from  the  grouping  of  the  Sensibilities  we  turn  to  question  as 
to  their  essential  constitution,  we  shall  find  that  an  exercise  of 
the  sensibility  is  not  so  simple  an  affair  as  we  may  have  supposed. 
Dr.  McCosh  gives  a  list  of  five  essential  elements  in  an  Emo- 
tion. With  slight  modification  it  is  true  of  each  of  the  sensibili- 
ties. The  place  and  order  of  the  different  elements  may  vary 
in  the  different  species,  but  every  conscious  exercise  of  the 
sensibilities  involves  the  following  five  distinguishable  elements  : 

1.  An  appetence. 

2.  A  stimulus,  which  may  be  a  physical  disturbance  as  in  a 
sensation,  or  an  idea  as  in  an  emotion. 

3.  The  feeling  proper. 

4.  An  attendant  desire. 

5.  An  organic  effect. 

We  consider  these  briefly  in  order: 

The  term  Appetence  is  chargeable  with  some  ambiguity. 
It  suggests  appetite,  being  from  the  same  root.  But  though 
an  appetence  is  involved  in  every  exercise  of  appetite,  the 
appetence  is  not  the  appetite.  Still  the  appetites  will  furnish  us 
good  illustrations  of  the  place  which  the  appetence  holds  in  an 
exercise  of  any  sensibility.  A  man  immediately  after  eating 
his  dinner  has  no  appetite  for  beef  steak.  But  we  know  that 
it  is  very  probable  that  in  a  short  time  he  will  have.  We  know 
that  though  not  hungry  now,  there  is  something  in  his  constitu- 
tion which  has  remained  unchanged  and  which  in  a  few  hours 
will  manifest  itself  in  a  renewed  craving  for  food.  Now  this 
abiding  element  is  what  we  call  the  appetence.  It  is  that  in  the 
constitution,  physical  or  psychical,  which  renders  the  man 
capable  of  being  excited  in  a  certain  manner.  Appetences  do 

26 


EXERCISE  OF  THE  SENSIBILITIES  27 

not  always  reveal  themselves  in  the  composition  of  the  organism, 
and,  considered  as  belonging  to  the  soul,  they  are  below  the  hori- 
zon of  consciousness.  It  sometimes  happens  that  a  capacity 
for  a  given  exercise  of  the  sensibility  may  be  unsuspected  until 
some  peculiar  condition  comes  about,  in  which  it  suddenly 
flames  out  in  a  burst  of  feeling  which  surprises  us.  But  mark 
you,  there  was  something  in  the  man's  constitution  which  re- 
sponded to  those  conditions,  else  the  conditions  would  have 
availed  nothing.  The  case  of  the  pet  tiger  cub  is  an  illustra- 
tion. A  gentleman  in  India  secured,  from  the  den  of  a  tigress, 
a  cub  before  its  eyes  were  open.  He  took  it  home  and  fed  it  on 
milk  and  scraps  of  food  from  his  own  table.  It  grew  as  tame  and 
gentle  as  a  kitten.  It  would  follow  him  like  a  dog,  delighted  in 
being  caressed,  and  would  affectionately  lick  his  hand.  There 
came  a  day  when  the  rough  tongue  of  the  pet  slightly  abraded 
the  man's  hand.  The  jaws  closed  on  the  hand  with  a  growl, 
and  the  man  found  all  at  once  that  he  had  on  his  hands,  not  a 
harmless  pet,  but  a  wild  beast  of  the  jungle.  Up  to  that  moment 
the  cub  had  no  appetite  for  blood,  but  it  is  very  commonplace 
to  say  that  all  the  while  there  was  something  in  its  constitution 
different  from  the  constitution  of  the  lamb  or  the  kid,  a  some- 
thing to  which  that  smothered  growl  was  the  response.  That 
something  is  what  we  call  appetence.  Jack  London  is  reported  to 
have  said,  that  he  "had  two-legged  dogs  inniind"  when  he 
wrote  "The  Call  of  the  Wild,"  and  perhaps  the  persistence  of 
appetence  is  the  moral  lesson  in  that  wonderful  romance.  It  is 
a  fact  sometimes  forgotten,  but  which  moralists  and  religious 
teachers  might  ponder  with  profit  to  themselves  and  increased 
safety  to  their  disciples,  that  appetence  is  the  one  persistent, 
abiding,  unchanging  element  in  man's  psychic  life. 

For  the  exercise  of  the  sensibility,  some  stimulus  is  necessary. 
As  already  indicated,  this  stimulus  may  be  either  a  physical 
disturbance  or  an  idea.  In  the  case  of  a  sensation  it  is  always 
the  former;  in  the  case  of  an  emotion  it  is  the  latter.  An 
exercise  of  intellect  is  thus  seen  to  be  a  prerequisite  for  an 
exercise  of  the  emotions.  The  writer  remembers  once  being 
present  at  an  Aid  Society  entertainment,  where,  on  the  program, 


28  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

it  was  announced  that  a  certain  gentlemen,  well  known  for  his 
musical  ability,  would  sing  a  new  song.  Mr.  A.  was  greeted 
with  applause  as  he  came  on  the  stage,  and  to  the  tune  "  Con- 
trast, "  he  proceeded  to  give  us, 

"I  feel  like  I  feel  like  I  feel," 

repeated  eight  times  to  complete  the  strain.  Before  he  was 
half  way  through,  he  could  scarcely  be  heard  for  the  uproarious 
laughter  of  his  audience.  Yet  few-  who  laughed  that  night 
stopped  to  think  that  the  really  funny  thing  in  the  whole 
affair  was  the  psychological  absurdity,  the  impossibility  in  fact, 
of  a  man  feeling  intensely  with  not  a  thing,  apprehended  by  the 
intellect,  to  feel  about.  Let  it  be  remembered  that  he  who 
would  move  hearts,  must  either  give  his  hearers  some  adequate 
idea,  or  must  so  stimulate  their  own  thinking  that  they  invent 
one — which  is  in  fact  the  approved  rhetorical  device. 

The  Feeling  proper  is  the  central  element — the  one  best 
known,  in  any  exercise  of  the  sensibility,  and  for  our  purposes  it 
is  not  necessary  at  this  stage  of  our  inquiry  to  dwell  upon  it.  It 
is  that  to  which  we  naturally  turn,  that  of  which  we  think  when 
any  exercise  of  the  sensibility  is  mentioned.  If  I  say  "tooth- 
ache, "  the  one  thing  which  is  most  probably  suggested  to  you 
is  not  the  peculiar  physiological  constitution  whereby  it  is  made 
possible  that  a  tooth  may  ache,  nor  yet  the  abuse  of  those 
organs  that  furnished  the  stimulus,  nor  the  effect  in  the  decay 
of  the  teeth;  the  word  suggests  to  you,  first  of  all,  that  excruciat- 
ing ache. 

It  may  be  asked  why  we  have  not  given  desires  as  a  class  of 
sensibilities;  some  psychologists  do  so;  and  it  is  a  fruitful 
source  of  confusion,  in  their  classification,  for  desires  do  not 
constitute  a  class  by  themselves.  A  little  self-examination  will 
show  you  that  desire  attends  the  exercise  of  each  and  every  one 
of  the  sensibilities — a  desire  proportioned  to  the  energy  of  the 
experience.  It  may  be,  often  is,  only  a  desire  for  the  cessation 
or  continuance  of  the  experience,  but  desire  there  is,  in  every 
experience  of  the  sensibility,  which  rises  into  consciousness. 

The  last  element  to  be  noticed  is  an  organic  effect.  That 
psychical  action  of  some  kind  does  have  an  organic  effect  is  well 


EXERCISE  OF  THE   SENSIBILITIES  29 

known.  It  now  seems  probable  that  it  is  an  exercise  of  the 
Sensibility  which  is  effective  in  working  changes  in  the  organ- 
ism. As  an  example,  the  effect  of  severe  intellectual  effort  in 
causing  cold  hands  and  feet  is  cited.  But  if  one  will  examine 
his  experience  carefully,  he  will  find  that  this  phenomenon 
occurs  only  when  so  absorbing  is  his  interest  that  he  works 
under  the  stimulus  of  excited  emotion.  It  is  the  emotion  which 
produces  the  effect.  It  is  doubtful  whether  an  intellectual  act 
alone  ever  produces  a  discernible  effect  upon  the  organism. 
Its  action  is  indirect.  Intellectual  action  gives  birth  to  an  idea, 
and  that  idea  may  become  the  stimulus  of  an  emotion.  And  it 
is  the  emotion  which  causes  the  flashing  eye  and  the  flushing 
cheek.  Literature  is  full  of  references  to  the  organic  effect  of 
some  emotions.  Two  very  old  examples  may  be  given:  "Now 
a  thing  was  secretly  brought  to  me  and  my  ear  received  a  little 
thereof,  in  thoughts  from  the  visions  of  the  night,  when  deep 
sleep  falleth  on  men.  Fear  came  upon  me,  and  trembling  which 
made  all  my  bones  to  shake.  Then  a  spirit  passed  before  my 
face.  The  hair  of  my  flesh  stood  up."  Job  4:  12-15.  And  in 
Virgil  we  have  the  familiar  line : 

"Obstipui,  steteruntque  comae  et  vox  faucibus  haesit." 
With  the  increased  interest  in  the  study  of  Physiological 
Psychology,  much  attention  is  being  given  to  these  effects,  and 
an  attempt,  only  partially  successful,  has  been  made  to  identify 
every  emotion  with  some  bodily  movement  as  its  concomitant 
and  sign.  When  so  much  is  discerned  on  the  surface  of  the 
body,  what  must  be  going  on  in  those  more  delicate  tissues, 
nerve  fibres,  and  brain  cells?  That  every  feeling  registers 
itself  in  some  permanent  change  in  nerve  tissue  and  tends  to 
make  habits  of  feeling  permanent  is  perhaps  a  rather  hasty 
induction.  But  if  care  be  taken  to  guard  against  that  seductive 
lapse  of  judgment  which  would  identify  the  feeling  with  the 
organic  change,  it  would  seem  to  be  a  safe  working  hypothesis 
for  the  man  who  would  truly  educate  either  himself  or  others. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  QUANTITY  AND  QUALITY  OF  THE 
SENSIBILITIES 

WHILE  every  exercise  of  the  sensibility  has  all  the  elements  we 
have  named,  states  and  acts  of  feeling  do  still  differ  from  each 
other  in  Quantity  and  in  Quality. 

By  the  quantity  of  a  sensibility  we  mean  the  energy  with 
which  the  soul  acts  in  any  given  exercise.  In  our  language, 
most  words  which  describe  our  emotional  states  have  compara- 
tive and  superlative  variations.  "Thou  hast  put  gladness  in 
my  heart  more  than  in  the  time  that  their  corn  and  their  wine 
increased."  There  is  "the  saddest  word  of  tongue  or  pen." 
The  school  girl  declares,  "I  was  the  maddest  to-day  that  I  ever 
was  in  my  life."  The  consciousness  of  each  one  will  assure 
him  that  he  lives  in  his  various  sensitive  states  in  varying 
degrees  of  energy.  Some  are  more  intense  than  others.  No 
doubt  it  would  be  a  great  convenience  if  we  could  measure 
psychic  energy  as  we  measure  physical  forces,  by  pounds  of 
pressure,  by  so  many  horse  power,  so  many  candle  power,  by 
ergs,  watts,  and  calories.  But  in  the  present  state  of  science 
it  can  not  be  done.  The  true  psychometer  has  not  yet  been 
invented.  Various  tests  of  the  quantity  of  the  sensibility  have 
been  proposed,  all  of  them  as  we  shall  see  fallacious.  It  is 
almost  impossible  to  avoid  estimating  the  intensity  of  the  psy- 
chic activity  by  the  organic  effect.  This  tendency  has  a  large 
place  in  the  philosophy  of  the  "fellow  who  whistles  to  keep  his 
courage  up, "  of  those  who  "for  the  good  of  the  party"  applaud 
the  speech  they  know  was  poor,  and  of  those  "jolly  rooters" 
who  would  conceal  their  mortification  at  prospective  defeat 
by  yelling  louder  than  ever.  These  things  are  abnormal. 
But  even  if  the  test,  honestly  applied,  were  approximately  true 
of  the  same  person  at  different  times,  it  is  absolutely  untrust- 

30 


THE  QUANTITY  AND   QUALITY  31 

worthy  as  between  different  persons.  The  writer  once  heard  a 
professional  man  describe  a  ludicrous  experience  of  his  early 
years.  He  said  that  as  a  young  man  he  had  unlimited  confi- 
dence in  the  sincerity  and  intensity  of  feeling  of  the  person  who 
wept.  Said  he,  "In  those  days  a  crying  woman  could  wrap 
me  round  her  little  finger,  but  I  have  learned  that  tears  lie  more 
shallow  in  some  eyes  than  in  others. " 

Again  it  has  been  proposed  to  measure  the  intensity  of  the 
sensibilities  by  their  supposed  effectiveness.  The  sensibilities 
are  correctly  called  the  Motive  powers,  i.e.,  the  moving  powers 
of  human  life.  So  that  man  is  supposed  to  have  felt  most  keenly 
who  acts.  This  view  totally  ignores  the  activity  of  the  Will, 
in  which  as  we  shall  presently  see  the  man  himself  determines 
to  which  one  of  several  motive  forces  he  will  surrender  himself. 
And  yet  it  is  not  to  be  questioned  that  very  much  of  human 
conduct  is  determined  (we  do  not  say  necessarily  determined) 
by  the  difference  in  energy  with  which  the  same  object  appeals 
to  the  sensibilities  of  different  men.  Overlooking  this  difference 
has  been  the  occasion  of  much  Pharisaical  self-congratulation 
on  the  one  hand,  and  of  much  uncharitable  judgment  on  the 
other;  e.  g.,  I  like  the  smell  of  whiskey,  so  doesjny  neighbor; 
we  are  passing  a  saloon  together,  I  walk  on,  he  walks  in;  he  gets 
drunk,  I  come  home  sober.  "See  what  a  good  man  I  am.  It 
is  folly  to  talk  of  the  need  of  restraint  on  the  sale  of  intoxicants; 
look  at  me.  Any  man  can  let  it  alone  if  he  wants  to — like  I  did. " 
Sure  enough  he  can — and  yet  perhaps  had  I  as  much  to  resist 
in  letting  it  alone  as  my  neighbor,  I  would  be  in  the  gutter  also. 

The  Quality  of  a  sensibility  is  a  distinction  "based  on  the 
kind  of  good  which  the  exercise  of  that  sensibility  conditions. " 
With  this  in  mind  one  would  hardly  deem  it  necessary  to  say 
that  sensibilities  differ  in  quality.  And  yet  there  have  been 
those  who  say  that  the  worthiness  of  the  sensibilities  is  measured 
only  in  the  quantum  of  pleasure  experienced  in  their  satisfac- 
tion. Even  Paley  said  that  "Pleasures  differ  in  nothing  but  in 
continuance  and  intensity."  It  is  to  the  credit  of  John  Stuart 
Mill  that  he  said,  "It  would  be  absurd,  that  while  estimating 
all  other  things,  quality  is  considered  as  well  as  quantity,  the 


32  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

estimation  of  pleasure  should  be  supposed  to  depend  on  quantity 
alone. "  No  more  soothing  philosophy  could  be  found  for  the 
man  who  desires  to  live  a  life  of  unbridled  appetite  than  that 
which  denies  all  distinction  of  the  sensibilities  other  than  that 
found  in  the  amount  of  pleasure  yielded  in  their  exercise  —  this 
of  course  ranging  all  the  way  from  what  we  may  call  the  nega- 
tive quantity  of  excruciating  agony  to  the  hilarity  of  an  eternal 
debauch.  Eating  gives  me  pleasure,  so  does  an  hour  of  conver- 
sation with  my  friend.  Do  those  pleasures  differ  only  in  their 
quantity?  The  common  sense  of  mankind  will  always  say  no. 
The  affirmative  will  be  maintained  by  two  classes  of  persons 
only:  those  who  have  a  life  of  vicious  indulgence  which  they 
wish  to  excuse,  and  the  philosophers  who  have  a  theory  to 
defend. 

A  clear  recognition  and  an  honest  acceptance  of  the  doctrine 
of  the  quality  of  the  sensibilities  will  give  the  key  to  a  solution 
of  a  vexed  problem  in  philosophy.  It  has  been  assumed  that 
whatever  is  good  would  be  a  legitimate  object  of  human  effort 
and  devotion.  The  next  question  is:  What  is  good?  The 
discussion  has  proceeded,  while  the  disputants  ignored  the  fact 
that  the  term  good  had  somewhat  changed  its  meaning.  Let 
us  then  at  this  point  try  to  determine  the  generic  meaning  of 
the  "good."  The  complete  definition  of  a  term  may  not 
always  be  obtained  by  a  study  of  its  popular  use,  and  yet  that 
use  will  likely  take  us  to  the  root  of  the  matter — give  us  the 
generic  idea  of  the  term.  Is  there,  then,  any  one  idea  which  is 
always  implied  when  the  term  good  is  used?  To  study  the  use 
of  the  term,  take  a  number  of  examples.  A  lecturer  relates 
this  incident  of  his  childhood:  It  was  his  delight  to  frequent 
the  kitchen,  where  savory  articles  of  food  were  being  prepared, 
and  where  an  indulgent  mother  would  gratify  him  with  tastes 
of  sundry  custards,  cakes,  and  puddings  in  the  making.  His 
habits  of  prying  curiosity  grew,  until  his  mother  thought  a 
lesson  was  needed.  Seeing  her  stirring  something  in  a  jar, 
the  child  asks:  "What  is  that,  Ma?  Is  it  good?"  "Yes,  my 
child,  very  good  indeed."  "Give  me  a  taste."  Whereupon 
a  generous  spoonful  was  thrust  into  the  open  mouth,  the  next 


THE  QUANTITY  AND   QUALITY  33 

moment  to  be  spewed  out  with  much  gagging  and  sputtering, 
while  the  abused  complaint,  "'Taint  neither,"  was  met  with  the 
solemn  declaration:  "Yes  it  is,  my  child,  very  good  yeast,  indeed." 
The  writer  was  once  present  in  a  home  when  a  sick,  fretful,  and 
peevish  child  was  induced  to  the  taking  of  a  dose  of  necessary 
medicine  by  the  assurance  that  "it  is  good."  Now  those 
mothers  were  truthful  women  and  excellent  mothers.  In 
these  cases  they  did,  in  words,  tell  the  truth.  Yet  it  would  have 
been  impossible  to  have  persuaded  those  children  that  they 
had  not  been  lied  to.  The  word  "good"  had  a  different  mean- 
ing from  the  mother's  standpoint  and  the  child's.  The  mother 
used  it  with  the  mental  reservation  that  she  meant  so  and  so, 
but  she  expected  and  desired  that  the  child  should  give  it 
another  significance  —  a  meaning  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
child.  Was  there  anything  common  to  the  mother's  and  the 
child's  ideas  of  the  "good"?  Take  another  illustration: 
Some  of  you  have  seen  a  painting  like  this :  A  young  man  with 
a  haggard  and  sensual  face  sits  on  the  side  of  a  bed,  in  a  luxu- 
riously furnished  but  disordered  room.  He  has  stopped  in  the 
act  of  dressing  to  survey  the  confusion  about  him;  overturned 
chairs  and  tables,  a  lamp  upset,  and  a  window  curtain  burned, 
packs  of  cards  and  empty  whiskey  bottles  scattered  about,  in 
a  measure  offer  an  explanation  which  the  youngjaaan  voices 
by  saying,  "What  a  mighty  good  time  I  must  have  had  last 
night."  In  contrast  with  this  think  of  the  ancient  bard  as  he 
exclaims:  "Oh!  taste  and  see  that  the  Lord  is  good. "  Can  any 
one  discern  any  thing  common  to  these  .most  diverse  experiences? 
They  seem  separated  by  almost  infinite  lengths,  and  yet  there 
is  one  thing  common  to  them  and  that  is  a  gratified  sensibility. 
The  good  is  always  relative  to  something  and  somebody,  but 
men  will  always  speak  of  the  gratified  sensibility  as  good.  We 
need  not  argue  with  him  that  it  is  not.  We  may  show  him  that 
at  the  end  "it  biteth  like  a  serpent  and  stingeth  like  an  adder," 
but  the  subject  of  a  gratified  sensibility  can  not  do  otherwise 
than  call  it  so  far  a  "good." 

It  is  not  strange  that  we  shrink  from  admitting  the  propriety 
of  the  application  of  the  term  "good,"  in  any  sense,  to  things 


34  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

which  through  our  whole  lives  we  have  been  taught,  and  cor- 
rectly taught,  to  look  upon  with  disgust  and  loathing.     But 
remember  what  we  are  attempting.    We  seek  to  find  the  generic, 
the  universal  element  in  the  "good,"  by  observing  the  most  di- 
verse uses  of  the  word.    Unquestionably  we  have  seen  those 
uses.    The  riotous  debauchee  does  speak  of  his  revel  as  a  good 
time.    And  the  sweetest  singer  of  the  ages  calls  his  reverent 
communion  with  the  Infinite  good.    If  we  compare  the  two  men 
in  character,  we  find  one  of  them  pure,  the  other  vile.    We  find 
one  a  blessing  to  society,  the  other  a  curse.     Comparing  the 
effect  of  the  two  experiences,  one  tends  to  life,  the  other  hastens 
the  passage  of  its  subject  through  the  gates  of  death.    Each  man 
has  honestly  described  his  experience.    We  can  account  for 
their  employment  of  the  same  term  in  no  other  way  than  by 
believing  that  which  on  the  surface  seems  the  fact,  viz.,  that  these 
diverse  experiences  do  have  something  in  common.    Very  dis- 
similar things  may  have  a  common  element.    Here  is  a  banquet 
hall.    Its  tables  are  spread  with  the  most  luscious  viands  from 
every  clime.     Seated  at  the  tables  are  representatives  of  the 
highest  intelligence,  refinement,  and  culture  of  our  twentieth 
century  civilization.    A  mile  away,  out  in  a  stagnant  marsh, 
is  the  putrid  carcass  of  a  dead  horse.    Around  it,  over  it, 
partially  within  it,  quarreling,  fighting  for  chief  places  at  the 
feast,  is  a  flock  of  turkey  buzzards.     Can  you  imagine  (unless 
in  the  sketch  previously  drawn)  two  pictures  more  unlike  than 
these?    And  yet  you  must  agree  with  me  that  there  is  one 
thing  common  to  both.    Each  group  of  beings  is  engaged  in 
the  satisfaction  of  appetite.    But  what  different  appetites! 
So  in  the  case  under  consideration.    The  debauchee  has  a 
gratified  sensibility  and  calls  it  good.    The  saint,  in  his  rapture 
of  holy  reverie  has  a  gratified  sensibility  and  calls  it  good;  but 
how  diverse  the  "goods"!  what  a  difference  in  the  quality  of 
the  two  sensibilities!    If  our  observation  here  is  correct,  we 
need  not  be  surprised  should  we  find  that  the  correctness  of 
conduct  is  not  always  determined  in  the  choosing  of  a  good 
rather  than  an  evil,  but  in  the  choice  of  one  good  rather  than 
another  good.     The  saint  in  our  illustration,  unless  of  finer  clay 


THE   QUANTITY  AND   QUALITY  35 

than  most  saints  are  made  of,  was  not  insensible  to  the  tempta- 
tions to  a  life  of  riotous  indulgence.  He  has  made  a  choice 
between  goods.  Some  one  may  say  that  the  trouble  with  the 
young  man  in  our  illustration  was  that  he  did  not  know  "what 
was  good  for  him. "  This  observation  suggests  the  subject  of 
the  next  chapter,  in  which  the  place  of  the  intellect  in  the 
moral  consciousness  will  be  discussed. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE    INTELLECT  — ITS    PLACE    IN    THE    MORAL 
CONSCIOUSNESS 

So  interwoven  in  human  life  are  intellectual  and  emotional 
states  and  products  that  it  is  impossible  to  complete  what  we 
have  to  say  of  one  without  reference  to  the  other.  The  func- 
tions of  the  Sensibility  in  our  moral  life  .can  be  most  clearly  seen 
when  we  have  also  considered  the  manner  in  which  intellectual 
activities  enter  into  those  experiences  which  we  call  moral. 
As  the  intellect  is  simply  the  soul  endowed  with  and  exercising 
the  power  to  know,  whatever  there  is  in  a  man's  moral  life 
which  is  of  the  nature  of  knowing  is  an  intellectual  act  or  state. 

1.  To  know  the  several  states  of  the  soul,  even  though  they 
be  states  of  feeling  or  willing,  is  an  act  of  intellect;  for  example, 
the  discernment  of  the  motives  by  which  I  am  prompted  in 
any  line  of  conduct. 

2.  The  idea  about  which  the  soul  is  exercised  in  its  emo- 
tional experiences  is  an  intellectual  product. 

3.  The  intellect  is  called  into  action  in  the  application  of 
all  the  general  formulas  for  the  regulation  of  human  conduct. 
For  example,  the  oft  repeated  injunctions,  "Put  yourself  in  his 
place"  or  "  Whatsoever  ye  would  that  men  should  do  unto  you," 
etc.,  involve  acts  of  consciousness,  sense  perception,  memory, 
and  the  creative  imagination  —  all  intellectual. 

4.  But  probably  the  chief  function  of  the  intellect  in  our 
moral  life  is  in  the  formation  of  our  moral  judgments.    In  doing 
this,  the  soul  is  under  the  necessity  of  passing  judgment  on  the 
kind  of  good,  which  the  exercise  of  a  sensibility  conditions. 
We  say  of  two  goods,  both  present  in  our  thought,  that  one  is 
higher  than  the  other.    This  is  an  intellectual  act,   just  as 
much  as  it  is  to  say  of  two  books,  which  I  hold  in  my  hand,  that 
one  is  larger  or  heavier  than  the  other.     Does  any  one  ask  how 

36 


THE  INTELLECT  37 

the  intellect  determines  the  rank  of  goods?  Why  not  ask  how 
it  determines  the  relative  size  of  the  two  books?  In  many  cases 
you  form  a  judgment  at  once,  as  you  place  the  books  side  by  side. 
In  other  cases  you  may  find  it  necessary  to  apply  to  them  a 
common  measure.  You  lay  a  ruler  on  each,  and  call  that  the 
larger  which  covers  the  greater  extent  of  the  ruler.  You  have 
applied  your  intuitive  power  of  inspection  to  the  common 
measure,  instead  of  to  the  books;  but  in  either  case,  if  one  ask 
you  how  you  know,  you  must  fall  back  ultimately  on  the  soul's 
inherent  power  to  perceive.  Were  you  to  experiment  with  a 
person,  and  find  him  unable  to  comprehend  that  this  portion 

of  the  ruler,  i    2    3,  is  greater  than  this,  / £,  you  would 

abandon  the  effort  to  teach  him  measurements.  Now  in  deter- 
mining the  rank  of  goods,  there  may  indeed  sometimes  be  use  for 
that  calculating  morality  which  inquires  for  "the  greatest 
(amount  of)  good  to  the  greatest  number, "  but  we  insist  that, 
ultimately,  you  will  fall  back  on  some  of  those  primitive  cog- 
nitions, which  in  any  department  of  experience  lie  at  the  basis  of 
our  knowledge.  The  moral  judgment,  for  example,  which 
affirms  the  joy  of  gratitude  to  outrank  the  selfish  gratification-oi 
appetite,  is  based  upon  the  intuition  of  Design.  The  standard, 
with  reference  to  which  goods  are  graded,  is  found  in  the  capacities 
of  man  as  man.  Both  science  and  tradition  affirm  that  man  is 
placed  at  the  end  of  a  series  of  sentient  beings,  in  each  of  which 
are  found  capacities  for  a  particular  kind  of  life.  It  is  very 
common  to  consider  the  possession  of  any  capacity  in  an  animal 
as  a  mark  of  design  —  an  indication  of  an  end  in  its  being.  In 
a  bed  of  fossils,  the  naturalist  will  note  the  appearance  of  a 
particular  type  of  tooth  as  indicating  the  previous  existence  of 
an  animal  made  to  live  in  a  particular  manner.  If  human  beings 
were  capable  only  of  the  satisfaction  of  the  impulses  to  eat  and 
drink,  to  sleep  and  lust,  we  would  not  trouble  ourselves  in  a 
search  for  other  ends  than  those  which  might  be  met  in  so  doing. 
But  when  we  find  this  animal  endowed  with  a  capacity  in 
addition  to  these,  the  capacity  for  the  exercise  of  a  new  sen- 
timent, gratitude  for  example,  we  call  this  added  capacity  a 
higher,  and  the  good  a  worthier  one. 


38  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

It  is  not  to  be  understood  that  men,  in  the  determination  of 
the  quality  of  goods,  always  pass  through  this  tedious  process  of 
reasoning.  If  you  find  thrust  upon  you  the  opportunity  to 
satisfy  your  appetite  at  the  expense  and  at  the  damage  of  a 
benefactor,  you  do  not  reason;  you  simply  and  directly  affirm 
one  course  of  conduct  to  be  worthier,  more  befitting  your  man- 
hood than  another,  in  an  act  of  intuitive  judgment. 

Perhaps  the  relation  of  intellect  and  sensibility  to  each 
other,  in  our  moral  experiences,  may  be  best  seen  by  supposing 
a  concrete  case,  a  typical  one,  paraphrased  from  an  old  story: 
A  little  girl  stands  under  the  spreading  branches  of  a  large  tree, 
the  fruit  of  which  her  father  has  forbidden  her  to  eat.  Her 
attention  is  called  to  the  fruit  which  hangs  in  luscious  clusters 
just  above  her  head.  She  looks  and  sees  (intellect)  that  the 
fruit  is  "good  for  food"  (sensibility),  "and  pleasant  to  the 
eyes"  (sensibility  again).  On  the  other  hand  she  remembers 
her  father's  command  (intellect),  she  hesitates,  moved  by  her 
gratitude  to  him  (sensibility).  In  imagination  she  forecasts 
(intellect)  the  pleasure  of  his  approval.  Now  here  are  two 
goods.  They  are  both  good.  She  can  not  have  both,  though  she 
desires  both.  She  must  choose  between  them.  It  is  the  office 
of  the  intellect  to  pass  judgment  on  the  quality  of  these  two 
goods.  Whether  this  is  done  by  quick  and  sudden  intuition  or 
by  a  long  process  of  reasoning,  the  forming  of  that  judgment  is 
an  act  of  knowing,  and  is  to  be  classed  with  intellectual  acts  and 
processes.  But  so  soon  as  that  is  done,  and  (we  will  suppose) 
father's  approval  is  judged  to  be  a  higher,  a  worthier  good  than 
the  other,  there  rises  necessarily,  by  the  very  constitution  of  her 
being,  a  sense  of  obligation  to  choose  the  one  and  to  reject  the 
other,  and  this  feeling  of  obligation  we  must  classify  with  the 
sensibilities. 

It  is  possible  that  some  one  may  think  that  the  views  here 
presented  (if  accepted)  have  in  them  dangers  to  his  philosophy, 
theology,  or  preconceived  notions  of  ethics.  For  this  reason  let 
us  restate  briefly  some  of  the  things  we  have  set  forth  regarding 
the  relations  of  the  intellect  and  sensibility  to  our  moral  life. 
But  first  let  it  be  remembered  that  the  man  with  the  scientific 


THE  INTELLECT  39 

spirit,  like  the  righteous  man,  must  and  can  afford  to  be  brave. 
He  must  fear  nothing  but  error.  He  must  not  call  a  halt  in  any 
investigation  of  facts  because  he  suddenly  thinks  that  some 
preconceived  opinion  is  threatened.  He  may  very  properly  be 
cautious  in  his  inferences,  but  he  must  ia.ce  facts.  To  illustrate: 
I  am  not  bound  to  accept  every  inference  which  the  devotee  of 
evolution  makes  as  he  returns  from  his  researches  in  Biology, 
but  you  might  very  properly  call  in  question  my  intellectual 
honesty  were  I  to  refuse  to  look  at  his  facts,  e.g.,  the  similar 
structure  of  the  arm  of  a  man  and  the  wing  of  a  bird.  Now  at 
the  present  stage  of  our  inquiries,  we  are  only  examining  our 
moral  life  for  facts.  We  are  simply  trying  to  observe  the  part 
which  the  well  known  human  faculties  of  intellect,  sensibility, 
and  will  bear  in  man's  moral  experience. 

I.  The  sensibilities  furnish  the  field  for  the  exercise  of  the 
moral  life.    That  is,  the  natural  capacity  of  some  being  for 
pleasure  or  pain  is  a  necessary  condition  for  moral  activity. 
If  we  consider  the  moral  life  objectively,  you  call  an  action 
good  or  bad,  only  as  it  affects  the  welfare  of  some  sentignt 
being.    If  we  inquire  of  the  moral  life  subjectively,  we  say  that 
its  very  essence  is  in  the  choice  which  the  man  makes  among  the 
several  "goods"  presented  to  him,  and  you  call  the  man  virtu- 
ous or  vicious  as  he  chooses  to  gratify  this  or  that  sensibility. 

II.  We  said  that  it  is  the  office  of  the  intellect  to  form  the 
moral  judgments.    We  now  make  what  is  really  a  different  form 
of  the  same  statement,  when  we  say  that  it  is  the  office  of  the 
intellect  to  determine  the  content  of  duty  at  any  given  time  and 
place.    However  the  thing  may  be  done,  it  is  an  intellectual 
act.    If  the  things  presented  affect  myself  alone,  it  is  an  act  of 
intellect  to  determine  which  good  outranks  the  other  —  which 
is  the  higher  and  best  befits  a  man.    If  I  look  at  my  fellow  to 
see  how  my  proposed  action  will  affect  him,  it  is  an  intellectual 
process  which  determines  that  it  is  this  action  which  is  benevo- 
lent rather  than  the  other.    Many  a  good  sermon  has  been 
preached  from  the  text:    "Trust  in  the  Lord  with  all  thine 
heart  and  lean  not  to  thine  own  understanding,"  but  let  no  one 
suppose  that  in  so  trusting  he  has  relieved  himself  of  the  neces- 


40  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

sity  for  the  use  of  his  own  mental  powers  in  the  ordering  of  his 
life.  If  suspecting,  as  well  I  may,  that  I  am  unable  to  guide 
myself  through  the  mazes  of  philosophical  opinions,  I  desire  to 
commit  myself  to  some  authority  —  to  some  revelation  from 
Deity  —  still  the  act  of  determining  the  competency  of  any 
proposed  prophet,  priest,  church,  or  book,  as  well  as  the  inter- 
pretation of  the  message  is  an  act  of  intellect,  and  of  intellect 
alone.  But  whatever  the  basis  of  the  moral  judgment,  whether 
it  be  made  on  the  rank  of  the  two  "goods,"  on  the  happiness 
promised  to  my  fellowmen,  or  on  a  supposed  revelation  from 
God,  when  once  it  is  made  we  say: 

III.  The  moral  feelings  follow  the  moral  judgments. 
Those  feelings,  thus  dependent,  are  two:  one  of  obligation 
before  the  choice  or  act,  and  one  of  self -approval  or  self-reproach, 
as  the  case  may  be,  after  it.  When  the  soul  as  intellect  has 
passed  judgment  on  any  thing  and  said,  "This  is  the  right 
thing, "  immediately  there  rises  a  sense  of  obligation  to  choose 
that  thing  or  to  do  that  deed.  And  after  the  deed  is  done  or 
the  choice  made,  a  feeling  of  self-approval  or  self-reproach,  as 
the  case  may  be,  invariably  follows.  This,  too,  is  absolutely 
irrespective  of  the  objective  correctness  of  the  moral  judgment 
on  which  the  choice  was  made.  I  wait  for  any  philosopher  to 
show  me  any  other  guide  out  of  these  mazes  —  any  I  say  save 
this :  The  human  intellect  passing  judgment  on  the  exercises  of 
the  human  sensibility.  It  may  sometimes  prove  a  poor  guide, 
but  I  have  no  other.  "If  then  the  light  that  is  in  thee  be 
darkness,  how  great  is  that  darkness." 


CHAPTER  IX 
THE  WILL 

THE  Will  has  been  defined  as  "the  soul  endowed  with  and 
exercising  the  power  to  choose."     The  moral  philosopher  has 
no  fault  to  find  with  this  definition,  for  it  is  with  choices 
properly  so  called  that  he  is  chiefly  concerned.    The  only 
reason  for  hesitation  and  critical  examination  of  the  definition 
is  the  dispute  among  philosophers  as  to  the  existence  of  such 
a  power.    The  dispute  would  have  been  less  bitter  had  there 
been  a  little  more  caution  in  the  psychological  classification. 
Some  have  erred  in  confounding  the  will  with  external  action. 
One  eminent  psychologist  seems  to  dispense  with  the  term 
"will"  altogether,  suggesting  the  division  of  human  activities 
into  "Thinking,  Feeling,  and  Doing."     But  Choosing  and  Do- 
ing are  clearly  not  identical.    Another  blunder  is  in  the  assump- 
tion that  every  human  action  is  preceded  by  a  choice  properly 
so  called  to  act  in  that  manner.    A  teacher  sat  at  her  desk 
one  afternoon,  when  she  was  startled  by  a  clear,  shrill  whistle, 
coming  unmistakably  from  the  corner  of  the  room  where  sat 
the  most  attentive,  orderly,  and  studious  pupil  in  the  school, 
a  clear  eyed  boy  of  ten  years,  now  all  blushes  and  confusion. 
When  accused  of  this  infraction  of  good  order,  and  facing  sum- 
mary punishment,  he  managed  to  stammer:   "I  tell  you,  Miss 
Jones,  I  didn't  whistle,  it  just  whistled  itself. "    That  boy,  out 
of  the  depths  of  his  self-consciousness,  had  recognized  a  dis- 
tinction which  many  psychologists  have  missed  in  their  imper- 
fect classification.    There  are  human  actions,  even  aside  from 
those  called  "reflex,"  conscious  activities  and  involving  the 
use  of  voluntary  muscles,  which  do  not  result  from  and  are  not 
preceded  by  a  choice  at  all.    If  the  faculty  called  "Will"  is 
to  include  every  psychical  act  not  included  in  knowing  and 
feeling,  we  evidently  need  a  subdivision  of  will  to  mark  the 


42  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

distinction  between  our  "whistling"  school  boy  and  the  one 
of  whom  we  would  say  "he  did  it  willfully."  Dr.  James  seems 
to  feel  this  necessity,  for  he  speaks  of  choices  "with  and  with- 
out deliberation,"  the  former  term  being  used  for  what  we  be- 
lieve to  be  choice  properly  so  called.  But  deliberation,  though 
generally  present,  is  not  the  characteristic  which  sets  off  choices 
in  a  class  by  themselves.  The  one  essential  mark  of  a  choice, 
that  which  distinguishes  it  from  every  other  act  and  state  of  the 
soul,  is  the  presence  of  a  self-determining  activity.  A  popular 
lecturer,  recently  holding  up  to  ridicule  certain  religious  teach- 
ing, told  of  a  little  boy,  who  in  an  altercation  with  a  playmate, 
had  spit  in  her  face.  Appropriate  punishment  was  administered 
at  the  time,  and  in  the  evening,  when  the  boy  was  about  to 
say  his  prayers,  his  mother  took  occasion  to  paint  in  darkest 
hue  the  conduct  of  the  day,  charging  all  malicious  and  evil 
propensities  on  that  "old  serpent  the  Devil."  But  the  little 
fellow  retorted:  "Well,  now,  mamma,  I  don't  know  much 
about  what  the  Devil  does,  but  that  spitting  I  tell  you  I  did 
it  my  own  self."  That  child  recognized  the  existence  in  him 
of  a  power  of  self-determination,  and  that  the  possession  of 
this  power  was  the  ground  of  responsibility. 

Choice  implies  alternativity  of  conduct.  That  is  that  an^- 
other  act  was  possible.  That  being  can  not  be  said  to  choose, 
which  is  driven  helplessly  in  any  course  of  conduct  by  forces 
either  within  or  without.  The  writer  remembers  hearing  that 
prince  of  thinkers,  Dr.  Emory  Miller,  in  a  lecture,  discuss  the 
characteristics  of  three  classes  of  being:  (i)  that  class  which 
is  represented  by  the  chair  or  table,  so  wide,  so  long,  so  high. 
It  is  here  in  this  room,  with  no  power  to  change  its  form  or  to 
move  in  space,  the  helpless  victim  of  forces  without  it;  (2)  the 
great  mass  of  living  creatures  like  the  fish,  the  bird,  the 
bee,  the  quadruped,  each  one  in  its  life  necessarily  manifesting 
its  inherent  constitution,  acting  as  it  is  compelled  to  act  by 
the  forces  within  it;  (3)  a  class  of  beings  marked  by  the  power 
of  self-determination,  feeling,  it  is  true,  the  surging  of  impulses 
within,  but  able,  on  occasion,  to  arise  in  the  self-assertive 
dignity  of  human  being  and  declare  and  make  good  the  declara- 


THE  WILL  43 

tion  of  his  own  self-mastery.  "Thus, "  said  he,  "we  have  these 
three:  thingality,  brutality,  and  personality."  There  is  'a  vol- 
ume of  philosophy  in  those  three  words. 

There  have  been  those  who  denied  the  existence  of  will, 
meaning  thereby  the  power  of  self-determination,  who  have 
contended  that  all  so-called  choices  are  necessitated  by  the 
inner  constitution  of  the  man  as  acted  upon  by  a  given  environ- 
ment; that  what  we  are  accustomed  to  call  a  choice  is  only  the 
response  of  the  soul  to  the  more  energetic  sensibility.  Several 
considerations  have  made  this  view  seem  plausible  to  some: 

i.  Biological  researches  have  in  many  ways  narrowed  the 
chasm  between  man  and  those  beings  which  we  call  brutes. 
Though  many  resemblances  between  the  human  and  the  brute 
body  have  been  known  for  ages,  it  may  be  safely  said  that  to-day 
we  recognize  a  degree  of  similarity  which  was  not  dreamed  of  fifty 
years  ago.  Resemblances  between  human  and  brute  intelli- 
gence, too,  are  continually  coming  to  light.  If  we  possessed 
the  facilities  for  studying  the  brute's  psychical  processes  as  we 
can  those  of  digestion  and  secretion,  it  might  possibly  appear 
that  the  Darwinian  would  have  new  and  greater  reason  to  argue 
the  common  ancestry  of  the  dog,  the  pig,  and  the  man. 

Now  it  is  generally  conceded — no  one  thinks  it  worth  while 
to  dispute  it — that  the  brute  is  not  a  self-determining  being. 
The  brute's  determination  is  the  response  of  the  brute  soul  to 
the  brute  environment.  He  always  yields  to  the  most  energetic 
sensibility.  Every  lad  who  has  ever  taken  the  slops  to  the 
hogs  has  in  mind  a  striking  illustration  of  this  fact.  On  the 
appearance  of  the  swill  pail  they  all  rush  for  it.  They  can  not 
do  otherwise.  They  can  only  be  kept  back  while  the  swill  is 
being  emptied  into  the  trough  by  exciting  some  sensibility 
more  energetic  than  appetite.  The  more  hungry  they  are  the 
greater  the  energy  which  must  be  put  into  the  counter  irritant. 
The  common  plan  is  to  thump  the  pig  over  the  nose  with  a 
stick.  He  stands  back.  He  can  not  do  otherwise,  now,  than 
stand  back.  He  stands  back  and  squeals.  He  can  not  do  other- 
wise than  squeal.  Withdraw  the  stick,  and  once  more  he  rushes 
to  the  trough.  He  can  not  do  otherwise.  He  is  very  determined, 


44  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

but  not  self-determined,  and  it  is  not  in  his  capacity  to  become 
so.  Now  it  is  a  short  cut,  and  like  very  much  scientific  infer- 
ence, to  argue  from  the  pig  to  the  man. 

2.  Much  of  the  life  of  many  men  fails  to  reveal  to  us  any 
trace  of  the  exercise  of  self-determination.  Many  men  do  live 
very  much  as  the  brute  lives.  Excite  one  set  of  sensibilities 
and  you  have  one  type  of  a  man,  excite  another  set  of  sensibili- 
ties and  you  have  an  entirely  different  one.  The  fickleness  of 
crowds  under  the  spell  of  orators  and  actors  who  know  how 
to  play  with  human  passions  is  well  known. 

To  these  considerations  it  may  be  answered  that  the  moral 
philosopher  is  not  contending  that  men  always  make  choices, 
but  that  they  can  make  them.  Very  much  of  human  life  may 
be  lived  on  the  brute  level,  but  if  at  any  time  the  man  reveals 
the  power  to  "take  himself  in  hand"  so  to  speak,  if  at  any  time 
he  does  exercise  self-determination,  then  the  power  of  making 
choices  is  a  factor  to  be  reckoned  with  in  any  analysis  of  his 
constitution.  Some  speculative  objections  have  been  urged 
against  the  doctrine  of  human  freedom: 

1.  It  has  been  said  that  in  affirming  the  doctrine  of  human 
freedom,  we  run  athwart  the  universal  law  of  causation;  that 
according  to  this  doctrine  we  would  have  some  events  —  choices 

—  without  causes.  In  reply,  it  may  be  said  that  so  far  is  this  from 
being  true  that  the  advocates  of  freedom  refer  these  events  to  the 
one  cause  capable  of  producing  them — a  self-determining  agent. 

2.  Again  it  has  been  urged  that  if,  in  emergencies,  men 
can  freely  choose  their  course  of  conduct,  there  ceases  to  be  any 
philosophy  of  history;  that  it  would  be  impossible  from  -what 
men  have  done  to  forecast  what  men  will  do.     We  reply,  even 
so.     While  such  a  large  portion  of  the  lives  of  so  many  men,  as 
we  have  already  conceded,  is  lived  on  the  brute  plane,  we  might 
reasonably  suppose  that  the  conduct  of  masses^of  men  could 
be  forecasted  with  reasonable  probability.    But  such  fore- 
casts become  more  and  more  uncertain  as  the  size  of  the  group 
diminishes,  and  if  you  attempt  to  predict  the  conduct  of  individ- 
ual men,  you  will  be  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  history  and 
politics  are  not  "exact  sciences." 


THE   WILL  45 

3.  But  perhaps  the  objection  which  one  hears  most  frequently 
among  devout  men  is  that  the  freedom  of  human  will  is  incon- 
sistent with  the  foreknowledge  of  Deity.  If  man  is  free,  if 
he  has  alternativity  of  conduct,  that  conduct  is  a  contingency 
until  it  occurs,  and  so  is  not  a  subject  for  knowledge.  But  if 
God  knows  that  an  event  will  occur  then  it  must  occur,  and  there 
can  be  no  contingency  about  it.  However,  a  man  may  think 
himself  free,  he  must  at  last  do  the  thing  which  God  has  known 
from  all  eternity  that  he  would  do.  This  argument  is  not  as 
common  now  as  it  was  in  the  days  when  a  fatalistic  theology  was 
more  popular.  Still  it  is  heard  with  sufficient  frequency  that 
the  student  is  likely  at  some  time  to  have  it  thrust  upon  him, 
and  to  be  puzzled  by  it.  It  might  be  in  order  to  inquire,  where- 
fore is  the  absolute  and  total  foreknowledge  of  Deity  thus 
assumed  as  a  sacredly  incontrovertible  proposition?  Why  must 
the  well  nigh  universal  conviction  of  men  that  they  do  make 
choices  be  set  aside,  lest  if  it  be  received  the  foreknowledge  of 
Deity  might  be  called  in  question?  We  have  read  in  an  old 
book  that  "his  eternal  power  and  Godhead"  "are  clearly 
seen,"  but  you  will  observe  that  the  great  philosopher,  who 
uttered  those  words,  did  not  name  omniscience  among  the 
things  so  clearly  discerned.  But  as  most  advocates  of  human 
freedom  have  no  wish  to  call  in  question  the  doctrine  of  the 
divine  omniscience,  and  would  shrink  from  the  appearance  of 
irreverence  which  some  would  think  involved  in  so  doing,  we 
will  not  raise  that  question  here.  We  will  examine  the  matter 
from  the  standpoint  of  those  who  sing: 

"Past,  present,  future  to  thy  sight, 
At  once  their  varied  scenes  display." 

1.  The  objection  in  question  assumes  that  the  means  at 
the  command  of  Deity  for  obtaining  knowledge  are  only  such 
as  are  at  the  command  of  men.     Finite  understanding  may  well 
be  modest  in  its  professions  of  knowledge  of  contingent  events, 
but  who  can  tell  the  avenues  of  knowledge  open  to  the  Infinite? 

2.  The  objection  overlooks  the  difference  between  the  cer- 
tainty of  an  event  and  the  necessity  of  an  event.    To  overlook 
this  is  not  unnatural,  because  many  events  are  both  necessary 


46  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

and  certain,  and  in  common  speech  the  words  are  used  inter- 
changeably, although  they  have  widely  different  meanings. 
The  necessity  of  an  event  lies  in  that  adjustment  of  forces — 
energies — which  is  capable  of  bringing  it  to  pass.  The  cer- 
tainty of  the  event,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  purely  subjective 
matter;  it  lies  in  a  knowing  mind  and  has  no  causative  energy 
whatever.  To  illustrate:  You  see  in  the  air  a  stone  which 
I  have  just  thrown  from  a  sling;  the  striking  of  the  earth  by 
that  stone  is  an  event  in  the  future;  it  is  a  necessary  event;  it  is 
also  a  certain  event;  but  the  necessity  has  nothing  to  do  with 
the  certainty.  The  necessity  lies  in  the  actual  adjustment  of 
three  forces :  (a)  the  energy  of  my  arm  which  thrust  it  out  into 
space  in  a  given  direction  and  with  a  given  velocity;  (b)  the 
resistance  of  the  air  through  which  it  is  propelled;  and  (c)  the 
constant  downward  pull  of  the  earth,  which  you  call  gravity. 
The  certainty  is  in  your  mind.  You  are  certain  it  will  fall, 
but  your  certainty  of  its  fall  does  not  effect  its  fall  in  the  least. 
It  would  have  fallen  just  the  same  had  you  been  in  ever  so 
much  doubt  about  its  falling,  as  indeed  you  are  as  to  the  particu- 
lar spot  of  earth  which  it  will  strike.  Knowledge  implies  two 
things.  "Objectively  it  implies  reality:  subjectively  it  implies 
certainty."  The  certainty  does  not  effect  the  reality.  The 
knowledge  that  something  has  been,  is  now,  or  is  going  to  be, 
has  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  its  being  so. 

In  support  of  the  doctrine  of  human  freedom,  we  would 
urge  that  the  truth  of  the  doctrine  is  rendered  very  probable: 

1.  By  the  presence  in  all  languages  of  words  which  assume 
it.    Men  do  not  give  names  to  experiences  which  have  no  reality. 

2.  By  the  language  of  men  in  judgment  of  their  fellows. 
You  can  not  at  any  length  discuss  the  conduct  of  your  fellow 
man  without   bestowing  on   him  words  of  praise  or  blame. 
These  words  would  have  no  meaning  at  all  if  you  considered 
him  always  and  everywhere  the  inert  victim  of  forces  either 
without  or  within   which  he  could  not  control.    Praise  and 
blame  of  your  neighbor  are  inconceivable,  unmeaning,  and 
unreasonable,  except  as  in  your  thought  you  have  invested 
him  with  a  power  of  alternativity  of  conduct. 


THE   WILL  47 

3.  A  similar  remark  applies  to  the  words  of  men  in  regard  to 
their  own  conduct.    We  are  familiar  with  the  sentiments  of 
self-approval  or  of  self-reproach,  always  implying  either  praise 
or  blame  of  ourselves.    These  sentiments  always  imply  more 
than  satisfaction  with  good,  or  regret  at  ill  results.    They 
always  involve  the  idea  that  our  own  free  choice  was  a  deter- 
mining factor  in  those  results. 

4.  But  the  crowning  proof  of  the  existence  of  this  faculty 
is  found  in  the  experience  of  the  individual.    We  know  that  we 
can  make  choices,  because  we  find  ourselves  making  them. 
I  know  that  I  do  sometimes  make  choices.    I  know  too  that 
when  I  make  them  I  could  have  made  different  ones.     I  know 
too  that  the  soul  in  making  them  is  eminently  active,  and 
though  states  of  knowing  and  feeling  both  precede  and  follow 
it,  an  act  of  choice  is  really  an  act  different  in  kind  from  either 
of  them.    Now  the   student  of   Psychology  must   stand   by 
the  facts  of  consciousness,  and  give  no  heed  to  the  objections 
based  on  the  consequences  to  any  philosophical  or  theological 
dogma  which  are  supposed  to  follow  the  admission  of  a  given 
fact.    When  a  man  can  not  argue  five  minutes  in  denial  of 
human  freedom  without  revealing  that  he  can  not  do  otherwise 
than  believe  that  both  he  and  his  auditor  are  free,  it  is  time 
that  we  cease  to  argue  with  him. 


CHAPTER  X 
CONDITIONS  OF  CHOICE 

THE  will,  as  the  power  to  choose,  does  not,  like  the  representa- 
tive power,  tend  to  incessant  activity.  We  have  already  called 
attention  to  the  fact  that  in  the  ordinary  course  of  life  there  is 
very  much  of  human  conduct  in  which  this  power  bears  no 
part.  It  is  in  a  very  subordinate  sense,  if  at  all,  in  which  the 
man  whose  life  is  swayed  by  the  storms  of  passion  can  be  said 
to  choose.  The  blameworthiness  of  men  often  lies,  not  so 
much  in  making  wrong  choices,  as  in  the  fact  that  they  do  not 
choose  at  all,  but  allow  themselves  either  to  drift  in  the  current 
of  other  men's  lives,  or  to  act  without  hesitation  in  the  direction 
toward  which  they  are  moved  by  the  more  energetic  sensibility. 
An  ancient  moral  teacher  pronounced  on  men  the  direst  calam- 
ities, not  so  much  for  evil  choices  as  because  they  "did  not 
choose  the  fear  of  the  Lord." 

The  power  to  choose  must  be  clearly  distinguished  from 
external  action  —  the  power  to  manifest  the  choice.  This  is 
external  and  requires  muscular  activity.  A  choice  is  wholly  a 
psychical  product.  The  fact  that  a  man  finds  himself  bound 
and  gagged,  that  he  cannot  move  hand  or  foot,  argues  nothing 
against  the  fact  that  he  may  choose  liberty. 

The  will  is  not  the  power  to  choose  without  a -motive. 
Some,  in  their  effort  to  exalt  the  dignity  of  will,  would  repre- 
sent it  as  a  cold,  calculating  faculty,  making  motiveless  choices 
in  an  atmosphere  charged  only  with  intellectual  ideas.  Not  so: 
—  a  motiveless  choice  will  not  be  found  in  the  whole  range  of 
your  experience.  This  leads  us  to  observe  that  the  will  is  not 
the  moving  power  in  human  life.  Men  displaying  great  energy 
in  the  conduct  of  their  affairs  are  sometimes  spoken  of  as  having 
"strong  will  power."  Perhaps  so  —  perhaps  not.  The  will 
does  not  impel  to  action.  That  is  the  function  of  the  sensi- 

48 


CONDITIONS  OF  CHOICE  49 

bility.  It  is  an  act  of  will  to  determine  to  which  sensibility  a 
man  will  yield  himself  — by  which  one  he  will  be  moved. 
Material  analogies  should  be  used  cautiously  in  speaking  of 
psychical  facts,  but  if  a  human  life  may  be  likened  to  an  engine 
on  the  track,  the  sensibilities  will  be  figured  by  the  heated 
steam  in  the  boiler,  while  the  office  of  the  will  may  be  illustrated 
by  the  hand  of  the  engineer  on  the  lever.  As  he  moves  it  this 
way  or  that,  the  engine  is  propelled,  by  the  steam,  forward  or 
backward  along  the  track. 

There  are  conditions  necessary  for  the  exercise  of  will  in 
choice.  In  contending  most  earnestly  for  the  existence  of  will 
and  for  its  freedom,  we  do  not  argue  that  it  has  unlimited  possi- 
bilities of  action.  Though  affirming  that  the  ability  to  make 
choices  characterizes  the  normally  developed  man,  I  would  not 
affirm  that  all  imaginable  choices  are  possible,  or  that  the  same 
choices  are  possible  to  each  and  every  man,  or  that  all  choices 
which  are  possible  are  made  with  equal  energy,  or  that  a  man1, 
now  having  the  power  to  make  a  choice,  will  always  have  it. 
On  the  other  hand,  observation  will  show  to  be  true  what  would 
speculatively  seem  probable,  that  as  there  are  conditions  for 
the  exercise  of  intellect  and  sensibility,  so  there  are  prerequisites 
for  the  exercise  of  will.  As  there  are  limitations  to  human 
knowledge,  so  there  are  bounds  to  the  field  of  human  choices. 
As  intellect  and  sensibility  are  subject  to  education,  so  is  the 
will.  As  intellect  and  sensibility  may  be  impaired  until  the 
man  becomes  a  driveling  idiot  or  a  heartless  wretch,  so  may  the 
power  to  choose  be  dwarfed  and  stunted  until  the  man  becomes 
a  helpless  changeling.  The  conditions  for  making  choices  are: 

1.  That  the  soul  shall  be  in  a  state  of  rational  conscious- 
ness.   Those   determinations   which    are   made   in    sleep,   in 
dementia,  in  intoxication,  in  anaesthesia,  are  not  choices.     In 
them  the  soul  is  driven  helplessly  by  the  force  of  an  excited  and 
energetic   sensibility.    There  is  determination,  but  not  self- 
determination. 

2.  In  order  that  a  choice  may  be  made,  there  must  be  at 
least  two  "goods"  presented  to  consciousness.    These  goods 
may  be  tangible  or  ideal;  they  may  be  material  objects,  or 


So  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

states  of  the  soul,  continued  pleasant  sensations  or  relief  from 
painful  ones;  the  point  to  be  emphasized  is,  that  there  must  be 
at  least  two  goods  presented.  The  action  of  the  soul  in  the 
presence  of  only  one  is  ridiculed  in  the  proverb  about  "Hob- 
son's  choice, "  a  case  in  which  there  is  no  choice  at  all. 

3.  There  must  be  some  finite  ratio  between  the  pressures  of 
the  two  affected  sensibilities.  We  observed  that  the  sensibilities 
differed  in  quantity.  The  experience  of  any  man  will  assure 
him  that  the  several  sensibilities  press  him  toward  action,  with 
varying  degrees  of  energy.  The  lightning  bolt  struck  with 
varying  degrees  of  force,  and  electric  shocks  were  felt  to  vary  in 
intensity,  many  years  before  physicists  had  invented  a  means 
to  measure  the  force  of  the  so-called  electric  current.  Let  it  not 
be  forgotten  that  there  is  psychic  energy,  though  we  have  no 
means  to  measure  it  and  no  units  in  which  to  express  its  varia- 
tions. Let  any  two  sensibilities  which  come  in  competition  be 
represented  by  x  and  y.  The  ratio  of  the  pressure  of  these 
sensibilities  will  be  indicated  by  the  fraction  x/y.  Now  with 
the  brute,  if  the  relative  value  of  these  quantities  were  known, 
his  action  could  be  predicted,  for  he  will  always  yield  himself 
to  the  pressure  of  the  more  energetic  sensibility.  It  is  the 
normal  condition  of  man  that  his  action  is  not  necessitated 
by  the  ratio  of  these  sensibilities.  Within  a  large  range  of 
variation  of  the  value  of  x/y,  the  man  is  self-determining. 
Against  the  pressure  of  a  very  large  x  he  may  commit  himself 
to  the  course  of  conduct  indicated  by  a  very  feeble  y.  My  con- 
tention is  that  it  is  conceivable,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  does 
sometimes  occur  in  human  life,  that  the  disparity  of  values  of  x 
and  y  is  such  that  a  choice  is  impossible,  and  the  man  is  help- 
lessly swept  along  in  the  direction  of  the  more  energetic  sensi- 
bility. In  the  fraction  x/y,  you  may  assign  to  x  and  y  any 
values  from  zero  to  infinity.  So  long  as  those  values  are  both 
finite,  you  have  a  finite  ratio  and  a  choice  is  possible;  but  let 
x  =  i  and  y  =  o,  and  you  have  x/y  =  1/0  =  infinity,  and  choice  is 
impossible.  In  this  case  let  x  represent  appetite  and  y 
represent  conscience.  Let  x  be  infinite  and  y  any  finite 
quantity,  and  you  again  have  an  infinite  ratio;  choice  is  an 


CONDITIONS  OF  CHOICE  51 

impossibility,  and  the  man  is  irresponsible.  I  freely  concede 
that  this  doctrine,  unless  received  with  caution,  has  in  it  much 
of  peril.  It  would  be  a  dangerous  thing  to  tell  the  devotee  of 
unbridled  license  that  you  clear  him  of  responsibility  for  his 
conduct  since  you  are  satisfied  that  his  case  is  hopeless,  his 
power  of  choice  is  gone,  and  he  can  not  do  otherwise  than  he 
does.  On  the  other  hand,  if  our  proposition  is  correct  —  if  it  is 
a  possibility  that  appetites  and  passions  may  be  cultivated  by 
vicious  indulgence  to  a  point  where  they  become  absolute 
masters  of  the  man,  so  that  he  can  only  be  treated  as  the 
irresponsible  beast;  if  this  is  true,  it  then  becomes  a  perilous 
thing  to  hold  out  to  the  man  the  idea  that  at  any  point  which 
he  may  reach  in  his  downward  career  it  will  be  possible  to 
reform.  It  ought  to  be  one  of  the  most  powerful  deterrents  to 
the  young  man  entering  on  a  course  of  vicious  indulgence,\ 
that  there  is  a  point,  no  one  can  tell  where,  in  that  down  ward  \- 
course,  where  return  and  reform  are  impossible,  because  man- 
hood will  have  been  thrown  away;  the  very  power  to  make  a 
choice  being  lost.  A  great  temperance  worker,  who  had 
himself  many  times  reformed,  only  to  be  again  thrown  in  the 
ditch,  found  that  his  only  safety  lay  in  keeping  himself  where 
his  appetite  would  not  be  excited.  He  was  accustomed  to 
describe  his  condition  thus:  "There  are  times  when  you  might 
place  out  in  front  of  me  a  cannon  loaded  to  the  muzzle,  at  its 
mouth  place  a  glass  of  grog,  and  I  know  that  the  instant  I  touch 
it  the  cannon  will  explode  and  blow  my  body  into  a  thousand 
fragments.  Let  me  get  just  one  whiff  of  that  steaming  grog, 
and  I  have  absolutely  no  alternative  but  to  take  it."  Those 
who  knew  the  man  believed  that  he  correctly  described  his 
condition.  Our  doctrine  is  a  fearful  one,  and  the  awful  thing 
about  it  is  that  every  year  human  experience  is  adding  to  the 
probability  of  its  truth.  Man  is  normally  a  moral  person.  He 
is,  within  a  wide  range  of  the  sensibilities,  absolutely  self- 
determining.  He  can  by  his  own  deeds  bring  himself  into  a 
condition  where  choice  henceforth  is  an  impossibility.  He 
can  thrust  himself  down  to  the  level  of  the  brute.  Of  him  the 
decree  has  gone  forth:  "Let  him  that  is  filthy  be  filthy  still." 


CHAPTER  XI 
EFFECTS  OF  THE  EXERCISE  OF  WILL 

THE  WILL  has  been  the  least  studied  of  any  of  the  great 
divisions  of  the  faculties  of  the  soul.  The  obvious  reason  for 
this  is  the  brevity  of  its  action.  Acts  of  knowing  and  states  of 
feeling  are  somewhat  continuous,  and  this  continued  time  of 
their  action,  in  the  case  of  the  intellect  at  least,  gives  oppor- 
tunity for  their  careful  study.  Not  so  with  an  act  of  will.  It 
is  absolutely  instantaneous.  The  "goods"  between  which  a 
choice  is  to  Be  made  may  be  before  the  mind  for  any  length  of 
time.  Deliberation  may  be  long  and  tedious,  suspense  may  be 
painful,  and  yet  nothing  done  of  the  nature  of  a  choice.  When 
at  last  the  soul  does  choose,  it  is  the  work  of  an  instant.  It  is 
complete  and  done.  True,  it  may  be  reconsidered  and  reversed, 
but  that  is  only  the  case  of  another  choice,  with  a  history  like 
the  first. 

The  will  is  best  studied  in  its  effects.  However  brief  the 
activity  of  choosing,  the  results  continue  long  enough  to  give 
opportunity  for  careful  study.  In  some  cases  so  enduring  is  the 
effect  that  some  one  has  been  led  to  say  that  "every  choice  is 
for  eternity." 

The  first  and  perhaps  the  most  marked  effect  of  an  act  of 
choice  is  found  in  a  changed  attitude  of  the  soul  itself.  Poli- 
ticians and  jurists  have  a  word  that  describes  this  attitude 
better  than  any  other.  A  juror  is  rejected  because  he  is  believed 
to  be  "  committed."  A  lobbyist  approaches  a  man,  soliciting 
his  vote  for  some  measure,  but  is  met  with  the  answer,  "I  am 
committed."  The  meaning  in  each  of  these  cases  is  clear. 
The  man  has  made  his  choice  as  to  the  side  he  will  take  in  the 
given  controversy.  His  attitude  toward  it  is  not  what  it  once 
was.  There  is  a  somewhat  in  his  mental  content  which  will 
make  any  but  a  given  course  of  conduct  difficult,  perhaps 

52 


EFFECTS  OF  THE  EXERCISE  OF  WILL         53 

impossible.  An  effort  to  induce  him  to  swerve  from  that 
position  is  supposed  to  be  useless.  An  act  of  choosing  brings 
the  soul  into  and  leaves  it  in  a  state  of  committal.  This 
attitude  of  committal  is  manifested  in  a  changed  condition  of 
the  intellect.  To  know  is  to  "be  certain  that  something  is," 
and  within  certain  limits,  what  a  man  knows,  i.e.,  what  he  is 
certain  of,  is  largely  determined  by  what  he  has  chosen  to 
know.  A  choice  having  been  made,  all  facts  which  favor  the 
position  taken  are  readily  discerned  and  cordially  welcomed, 
while  those  of  a  contrary  character  are  thrust  aside  or  explained 
on  some  hypothesis  supposed  to  be  consistent  with  the  theory 
adopted.  It  is  unkind  to  charge,  with  dishonesty,  the  man  who 
"  e'en  though  vanquished  yet  will  argue  still."  It  is  cruel  to  say, 
"none  so  blind  as  those  who  will  not  see."  While  his  choice, 
in  all  probability  honestly  made,  remains,  the  fact  is  he  can  not^ 
see.  There  is  something  more  than  caricature  in  the  story  of 
the  enthusiast  in  regard  to  perpetual  motion,  who  came  to  a 
physicist  with  a  finely  wrought  model  of  his  machine.  He  was 
answered:  "Unfortunately,  sir,  the  facts  are  against  your 
theory,"  and  straightway  retorted,  "Well,  then,  so  much  the 
worse  for  the  facts."  A  more  truly  honest  answer  could  hardly 
have  been  given.  There  is  correct  psychology  in  the  proverb 
that  "a  man  convinced  against  his  will  is  of  the  same  opinion 
still."  Of  course  he  is.  The  convincing  was  from  your  stand- 
point. From  his  point  of  view,  he  is  not  convinced  at  all,  and 
his  will  remaining  as  it  is  he  can  not  be.  Every  political  crisis 
furnishes  examples  of  the  widely  divergent  views  of  equally 
good  and  acute  men,  with  equal  access  to  the  facts.  The 
explanation  of  their  different  attitudes  is  probably  found  in 
the  diverse  states  of  committal,  under  which  the  great  bulk  of 
the  facts  have  been  apprehended.  Sometimes  this  fact  impresses 
the  rustic  victim  of  it  as  something  uncanny.  Hear  one  of 
them:  "I  tell  you,  there's  no  use  talking;  men  is  just  naturally 
born  to  be  Demmycrats  or  the  other|thing  and  there  ain  't  no 

reason  in  it  at  all.    Now  look  at  me  and  Charlie  R ;  we 

was  boys  down  in  Kentucky,  and  we  was  chums  until  one  day 
when  we  was  ten-year-old  kids  we  went  to  the  county  seat  to 


54  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

hear  a  political  speaking.  Andrew  Jackson  spoke  on  one  side, 
and  Henry  Clay  on  the  other.  I  tell  you  it  was  a  big  day.  I 
know  I  did  not  understand  a  word  they  said  and  I  don't  believe 
Charlie  did  either;  we  just  liked  the  way  they  pawed  the  air  and 
tore  their  clothes,  and  the  way  the  crowd  took  on.  Well,  as  we 
went  home,  Charlie  and  me  got  to  talking,  which  made  the 
best  speech;  he  said  Clay  did,  and  I  said  Jackson  did;  he  called 
me  a  liar,  and  I  mashed  his  nose  for  him.  I  tell  you  I  don't 
understand  much  of  their  argying  and  big  talk,  but  some  way 
from  that  time  on,  I  just  couldn't  be  anything  but  a  Demmy- 
crat  and  I  suppose  Charlie  was  always  a  Whig  and  then  a 
Republican  because  he  couldn't  be  any  thing  else."  Sure 
enough,  on  the  evening  of  that  Kentucky  autumn  day,  in  the 
heat  of  their  childish  wrath,  their  choices  were  made  and  set. 
And,  ever  after,  all  political  discussion  came  to  them,  refracted 
through  the  medium  of  that  state  of  committal. 

In  the  summer  of  1868  the  writer  made  the  acquaintance  of 
two  brothers,  Edwin  and  William  W.,  both  men  of  energy  and 
character,  who  had  spent  their  whole  lives  in  close  touch  with 
each  other.  Born  and  reared  in  New  York,  learning  their 
trade  together,  in  young  manhood  they  went  south  together, 
and  found  employment  in  the  same  community,  until  in  the  late 
fifties  they  came  north,  and  located  on  the  broad  and  fertile 
Missouri  bottom.  In  all  these  years  there  had  been  only  one 
circumstance  to  mar  the  brotherly  feeling  between  the  two. 
When  the  Civil  War  came  on,  William  was  pronounced  in  favor 
of  the  Union,  while  the  utterances  of  Edwin  were  equally 
emphatic  in  favor  of  southern  politics  and  civilization.  A 
"modus  vivendi"  was  arranged  between  them,  the  condition  of 
which  was  that  public  affairs  were  not  to  be  mentioned  by 
either  in  the  presence  of  the  other.  It  was  a  mystery  how  these 
brothers  of  equal  intelligence,  integrity,  and  supposedly  equal 
acquaintance  with  the  facts,  should  hold  such  diverse  opinions. 
William  explained:  "It's  all  because  of  the  different  times  we 
made  up  our  minds.  When  we  went  south  we  walked  across  to 
Pittsburgh  and  took  passage  there  on  a  steamboat  for  New 
Orleans.  Our  boat  laid  up  at  Paducah  some  time  in  the  night, 


EFFECTS  OF  THE  EXERCISE  OF  WILL         55 

and  just  at  daybreak  I  was  wakened  by  yelling  and  cursing  on 
the  wharf.  I  looked,  and  through  the  mist  and  fog  I  saw  a 
gang  of  slaves,  chained  together,  being  driven  with  a  whip 
on  board  the  boat  to  be  shipped  south.  I  called  Edwin,  but 
he  was  a  sound  sleeper  and  it  was  all  over  before  he  awoke,  and 
I  could  not  describe  it  as  I  saw  it  so  it  would  look  that  way  to 
him.  My  mind  was  made  up  there;  Edwin's  was  not.  We 
went  on,  and  the  first  job  we  struck  was  building  a  mill  on  the 
plantation  of  one  of  the  best  and  kindest  men  I  ever  knew, 
and  his  whole  family  were  like  him.  You  have  seen  some  such 
people,  who  could  not  bear  to  allow  any  of  their  domestic 
animals  even  to  be  hungry,  thirsty,  or  cold.  It  was  just  like  the 
Shelby  homestead  in  "Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  only  more  so.  I  tell 
you  it  is  a  fact,  if  slavery  was  all  like  that,  it  would  not  be 
strange  that  some  folks  would  think  it  a  beneficent  institution. 
Edwin  made  up  his  mind  here,  but  I  could  not  forget  that 
under  the  law  the  exigencies  of  life  might  in  three  months  force 
these  same  men  and  women  through  the  same  experiences  as 
those  I  had  seen  at  Paducah.  I  judged  slavery  by  its  legal 
possibilities  of  evil,  but  Edwin  whenever  we  would  strike  any  of 
the  hard  things  would  remember  the  Noble  plantation  in 
Mississippi.  I  tell  you  it  was  all  in  the  time  we  made  up  our 
minds."  Not  less  truly  but  more  discriminatingly,  it  may  be 
said  that  the  condition  of  the  mind  as  it  was  "made  up"  through 
all  the  succeeding  years  was  determined  by  the  choices  made  at 
different  times,  under  different  feelings,  excited  by  different 
and  partial  views  of  facts. 

Another  good  illustration  from  the  same  field  is  that  of 
Abraham  Lincoln,  when  he  turned  away  from  the  auction 
block  where  a  slave  girl  was  being  sold.  He  said:  "Boys,  if  I 
ever  get  a  chance  to  hit  that  thing  I'll  hit  it  hard."  No  words 
could  more  plainly  show  that  a  choice  had  been  made,  and  from 
that  time  it  was  impossible  for  Lincoln  to  have  a  good  opinion 
of  any  system  of  human  bondage. 

It  can  not  have  escaped  the  thought  of  the  reader  that  very 
diverse  states  of  feeling  accompanied  these  different  intellectual 
states.  Not  the  intellect  alone  but  the  Sensibility  also  is 


56  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

affected  by  an  act  of  choice.  If  the  matter  concerning  which  a 
choice  is  to  be  made  is  one  of  importance,  it  is  probable  that  in 
the  deliberation  which  precedes  choosing  there  are  opposite 
emotions  arrayed  against  each  other.  During  deliberation  and 
hesitation,  one  feeling  acts  as  a  check  upon  the  other.  In  many 
cases  their  opposition  and  clashing  is  the  cause  of  the  hesitation. 
Now  let  a  choice  be  made,  and  forthwith  one  set  of  emotions  is 
as  it  were  let  loose  to  assert  their  absolute  control  of  the  man, 
while  the  others,  like  defeated  soldiers,  retire  from  the  field. 
"To  whom  ye  yield  yourselves  servants  to  obey,  his  servants  ye 
are,"  expresses  very  forcibly  the  dominance  over  the  man  of 
the  passion  to  which  he  has  yielded  himself  by  an  act  of  will. 
An  example  of  this  dominance  of  the  favored  sensibility  is  found 
in  the  lengths  to  which  an  excited  mob  will  go.  Many  a  man 
who  an  hour  before  was  tender  hearted  and  sympathetic, 
casting  his  lot  with  the  mob,  becomes  capable  of  deeds  of  the 
most  revolting  cruelty. 

The  reader  will  remember  that  this  psychological  review 
was  begun  with  the  question,  "What  is  it  that  constitutes  man 
a  moral  person?"  We  have  examined  intellect,  sensibility,  and 
will  in  their  relation  to  the  moral  life.  It  is  certainly  in  order  to 
ask  now:  What  is  there  left  in  the  moral  consciousness,  when 
out  of  it  there  has  been  taken  all  those  elements  which  are  of 
the  nature  of  knowing,  feeling  or  choosing?  Absolutely  nothing. 
The  so-called  "moral  sense,"  is  nothing  but  human  sense — 
applied,  it  is  true,  to  a  special  subject  matter.  Man  does  not 
need  a  special  sense  to  make  him  a  moral  being.  Give  to  any 
sensitive  being  self-determination,  plus  a  power  of  intellect  to 
discriminate  the  quality  of  goods  involved  in  the  exercise  of 
the  sensibilities,  and  you  have  the  conditions  of  moral  action 
and  moral  responsibility.  Man's  moral  nature  is  the  necessary 
concomitant  of  his  human  nature.  If  at  any  time  in  our 
future  discussion  the  term  moral  sense  should  be  used,  no 
criticism  need  be  made  upon  it,  if  only  it  is  understood  that 
there  is  indeed  a  moral  sense,  but  it  is  found  in  the  superior 
intelligence  which  is  able  to  discriminate  in  the  quality  of 
"goods,"  and  pronounce  one  of  them  higher,  worthier  than 
another,  on  account  of  its  consonance  with  an  ideal. 


CHAPTER  XII 
MORAL  GOOD 

FEW  questions  in  Moral  Philosophy  are  of  greater  importance 
than  those  relating  to  the  nature  of  moral  good.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  in  our  previous  discussion  we  saw  that  the 
"good"  always  is  related  to  the  satisfaction  of  some  sensibility. 
We  may  then  approach  the  study  of  the  "moral  good"  by 
observing  that  it  must  be  that  which  will  satisfy  the  moraK 
feelings.  It  must  be  that  in  my  own  conduct  which  satisfies 
the  senses  of  obligation  and  self-approval  or  that  which,  if 
done  by  another,  arouses  in  me  the  sense  of  merit. 

Next  it  is  to  be  observed  that  there  is  no  single,  specific, 
external  activity  which  always  and  everywhere  will  meet  this 
requirement.  Evidently  a  definition  of  moral  good  must  have 
about  it  some  elasticity.  We  suggest  the  following,  slightly 
modified  from  President  Porter:  "Moral  good  is  the  choice  of 
the  highest  natural  good  possible  to  a  man,  at  a  given  time,  as 
known  to  himself  and  by  himself,  and  interpreted  with  refer- 
ence to  the  end  of  his  being  and  activities." 

Some  observations  on  this  definition  may  be  useful: 
i.  It  places  the  moral  quality  of  a  man  in  the  choices 
which  he  makes.  There  can  be  no  doubt  as  to  the  correctness 
of  this  position.  There  is  no  moral  quality  in  the  simple  act 
of  knowing  (though  the  choice  to  gain  or  to  refuse  knowledge 
may  have  that  quality).  A  man  deserves  neither  praise  nor 
blame  for  simply  apprehending  what  is  presented  to  him. 
Neither  is  there  any  merit  or  guilt  in  the  simple  exercise  of  the 
sensibility.  The  appropriate  object  being  presented  and 
attended  to,  the  corresponding  sensibility  must  be  aroused. 
States  of  feeling  become  worthy  of  praise  or  blame  only  when 
by  acts  of  will  they  are  consented  to  and  the  inner  man  is 
committed  to  them.  Further,  the  external  actions  have  no 

57 


58  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

moral  quality  apart  from  the  choices  they  manifest,  confirm, 
or  make  effective.  This  is  said,  too,  in  full  recognition  of  the 
fact  that  all  of  human  and  much  of  Divine  law  is  concerned 
with  external  conduct.  Its  language  is  always  "thou  shalt" 
or  "thou  shalt  not"  do.  But  nothing  is  better  understood 
than  that  we  expect  to  judge  our  fellows  and  to  be  ourselves 
judged,  not  by  what  we  have  chanced  to  do  but  by  what  we 
chose  to  do.  This  is  the  principle  on  which  men  are  cleared 
of  blame  in  the  unforeseen  and  purely  accidental. 

2.  The  moral  quality  of  the  man  is  determined,  not  by  the 
rank  of  the  good  chosen  as  it  might  be  known  to  an  infinite 
mind,  but  by  its  rank  as  known  "to  himself  and  by  himself." 

3.  Our  definition  guards  against  that  subtle  error  often 
made  by  the  devotee  of  pleasure,  that  of  confounding  the  rank 
of  a  good  with  the  quantity  of  the  sensibility.     We  saw  that  ito 
is  the  office  of  the  intellect  to  determine  the  rank  of  goods. ' 
The  amount  of  immediate  satisfaction  experienced  in  securing 
goods  is  no  criterion  whatever  of  their  relative  rank.    Yet 
that  is  precisely  the  standard  by  which  large  numbers  of  men 
determine  their  action.    It  is  the  standard  of  the  brute.     Our 
definition  guards  against  this  error,  saying:    "interpreted  with 
reference  to  the  end  of  his  being  and  activities."    It  may  be 
objected  that  our  definition  is  open  to  the  charge  of  indefinite- 
ness  as  its  supposes  the  "end  of  his  being"  to  be  known,  and 
philosophy  has  not  yet  settled  what  that  end  may  be.     Some, 
philosophers  say  that  it  is  "  to  glorify  God  and  to  enjoy  Him 
forever,"  others  hold  the  view  tersely  set  forth  by  a  recent 
scientific  lecturer  that  it  is  "to  perpetuate  the  species,  and  to 
care  for  the  same."    It  might  be  to  our  advantage  if  the  end 
of  our  being  were  recognized  with  the  general  agreement  that 
exists  as  to  the  sum  of  two  and  three.    A  man's  conduct,  no 
doubt,  will  vary  with  the  conception  he  may  have  of  the  "end 
of  his  being,"  and  yet  there  are  limits  to  the  conceptions  he 
may  have  of  that  end.    There  are  depths  of  absurdity  never 
reached,  unless  in  the  vagaries  of  the  insane.    No  one  has  ever 
yet  set  forth  the  thesis  that  it  is  the  end  of  man's  being  to 
make  himself  the  most  mischievous  fellow  possible,  or  to  be 


MORAL  GOOD  59 

the  worst  man,  the  most  impious  man  possible,  or  to  make  the 
world  the  most  uncomfortable  place  possible  for  his  fellows  to 
live  in.  It  is  remarkable  that  even  those  whose  lives  might 
lead  us  to  suppose  that  they  had  so  conceived  the  end  of  life, 
in  the  apologies  they  make  for  themselves,  are  in  haste  to  dis- 
claim such  a  thought.  Alexander,  Caesar,  Napoleon,  and  the 
modern  bomb  thrower  will  all  protest  that  their  crimes  were 
wrought  in  the  interest  of  some  portion  of  humanity.  And  even 
the  grog  makers  and  grog  venders  would  fain  pose  as  temperance 
advocates,  and  not  at  all  as  promoters  of  drunkenness.  Without 
considering  the  sincerity  of  these  claims,  it  may  be  said  that 
the  fact  that  they  are  made  shows  that,  while  there  are  no 
doubt  errors  into  which  men  may  fall,  there  are  limits  to  thfe 
vagaries  of  their  conception  of  the  end  of  man's  being  to  which 
they  have  not  gone  and  we  believe  cannot  go. 

4.  Our  definition  does  not  require  as  a  prerequisite  for  the 
realization  of  moral  good  that  a  man  should  have  reached 
objective  correctness  in  his  conception  of  the  end  of  his  being. 
It  does  require,  however,  that  he  shall  rationally  form  some 
conception  of  it,  then  that  he  shall  have  regard  to  that  con- 
ception as  he  deliberates  on  the  relative  rank  of  two  competing 
goods.  To  such  a  man  moral  good  is  possible  even  though  his 
conception  of  the  end  of  man  may  be  very  incomplete,  or  may 
even  contain  some  great  error.  Two  examples  were  given  of 
conceptions  of  the  end  of  man's  being  as  widely  divergent  as 
men  have  ever  formed.  If  we  are  to  choose  our  conception 
between  the  two,  it  is  not  a  matter  of  indifference  which  view  is 
taken. 

The  man  with  one  conception  has  scaled  a  lofty  mountain, 
heaven's  clear  blue  is  over  his  head,  and  his  outward  gaze 
sweeps  beyond  the  stars;  the  man  with  the  other  has  his  feet 
still  in  the  mire.  Mists  and  fog  are  around  his  head.  He  can 
not  see  afar  off.  And  yet  I  do  hold  that  moral  good  is  attain- 
able by  him.  He  has  rationally  formed  a  conception  of  the 
end  of  his  existence  and  activities;  imperfect  though  it  be,  it 
is  better  than  none.  Let  him  now  continually  keep  that  end 
in  view.  Would  you  know  something  of  the  results  possible 


60  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

to  those  with  such  conceptions,  read  an  old  story  in  an  old  book 
(Judges  13:2-14).  A  race  of  Samsons  would  be  a  poor  race,  but 
it  would  be  an  improvement  on  some  the  world  has  known. 
Samson's  parents  conceived  the  chief  end  of  man  to  be  to  per- 
petuate the  species  and  to  care  for  the  same.  From  our  stand- 
point it  seems  a  very  imperfect  ideal,  but  it  involved  a  choice 
of  goods  and  that  according  to  their  quality,  and  herein  lies 
the  essence  of  moral  good. 

5.  There  remains  one  very  practical  observation.  The 
choice  of  the  same  object  may  at  one  time  be  moral  good  and 
at  another  time  not  be  such.  The  life  which  commands  our 
approval  is  the  one  in  which  the  higher  good  is  uniformly  chosen 
whenever  two  goods  are  presented.  Blameworthy  conduct 
consists  in  the  choice  of  the  lower  good  when  two  goods  are 
presented.  This  is  true  no  matter  what  the  plane  of  the  man's 
natural  life.  It  is  not  the  objective  character  of  the  thing 
chosen  which  is  so  important  as  its  rank  as  compared  with  the 
goods  with  which  it  came  in  competition.  In  any  estimate  I 
make  of  my  own  life  and  conduct,  the  question  I  have  to  answer 
is  not  whether  I  have  chosen  a  bad,  a  wicked,  a  pernicious  thing, 
but  did  I  choose  the  best,  the  highest  thing  possible  to  me 
among  the  goods  presented  in  competition  with  each  other. 
This  view  of  the  matter  will  enable  us  to  see  how  the  same  exter- 
nal conduct  at  different  times  and  with  different  persons  may 
have  a  very  different  moral  significance.  We  sometimes 
unduly  praise  or  blame  our  fellows  through  overlooking  the 
principle  here  involved.  A  few  examples  may  be  given.  One 
often  hears  unstinted  praise  awarded  to  the  people  in  frontier 
communities  for  their  piety  in  going  such  long  distances  to 
church.  Not  wishing  to  take  aught  of  merited  praise  from  them, 
we  yet  say  that  when  we  compare  them  with  the  modern  city 
dweller  and  attempt  to  measure  the  piety  of  the  two  by  the 
miles  they  are  willing  to  travel  in  going  to  church,  we  are  likely 
to  overlook  some  important  facts.  The  choice  to  go  to  church 
measures  more  to  the  city  dweller  than  it  did  to  the  pioneer. 
Miles  to  travel  are  not  the  only  difficulties  to  be  overcome. 
In  pioneer  times  and  small  communities,  the  social  life  was 


MORAL  GOOD  61 

largely  identified  with  the  church  life.  A  man,  in  choosing  to 
go  to  church,  did  not  have  to  choose  between  the  church  ser- 
vice and  a  number  of  social  attractions.  The  church  service 
in  the  city  jcompetes  in  the  man's  mind  with  a  large  number  of 
very  attractive  goods.  The  city  dweller  to-day  who  chooses 
the  church  service  exercises  a  self-determination  in  the  choice 
of  goods  to  which  his  grandfather  was  a  stranger.  We  will 
take  another  example  of  the  different  moral  significance  of  the 
same  act  to  different  persons.  Take  the  case  of  the  Iowa 
farmer  and  the  half  civilized  Sioux  Indian  each  plowing  corn 
last  summer.  The  two  acts  were  the  same,  except,  perhaps, 
that  the  Iowa  farmer  did  more  of  it  and  did  it  better.  But  the 
civilized  man  thinks  of  his  corn  plowing  and  other  work  as  a 
matter  of  course.  It  is  one  of  the  inevitable  things  to  be  done. 
No  question  occurs  to  him  about  it.  His  corn  plowing  repre- 
sents no  deliberation,  no  reflection  on  the  quality  of  goods,  and 
no  choice  between  goods,  and  hence  no  moral  uplift. 

He  may  already  from  other  causes  be  a  much  better  man 
than  the  Indian,  but  his  corn  plowing  does  not  make  him  so. 
The  case  is  different  with  the  red  man.  All  the  traditions  of 
his  ancestry  are  against  the  thought  of  the  noble  brave  degrad- 
ing himself  with  toil.  His  present  attitude  is  the  result  of  a 
deliberate  setting  of  one  civilization  against  the  other.  He  has 
adjusted,  in  his  mental  balances,  the  excitement  of  the  chase, 
against  the  sweat-won  comforts  of  industry.  He  has  passed 
on  the  case  the  only  possible  judgment.  He  has  said  that  one 
was  higher  than  the  other.  And  now,  critical  moment — he 
chooses  to  plow  corn.  In  the  development  of  his  character  he 
has  received  an  upward  impulse  which  his  white  brother  will 
only  receive  by  reflecting  that  "the  life  is  more  than  meat,  and 
the  body  more  than  raiment. "  We  are  prepared  to  assert,  and 
history  will  verify  it:  that  no  external  activity  gives  any  cer- 
tain assurance  of  the  moral  development  of  the  actor.  Abner 
stands  before  us  a  man  among  men,  even  when  fighting  a  losing — 
yes  an  iniquitous — war  against  the  Lord's  anointed;  and  the 
sons  of  Eli  are  seen  in  the  depths  of  moral  inkiness,  even  while 
ministering  at  the  altar  of  the  sanctuary. 


62  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

The  life  is  not  moralized  by  any  simple  conformity  of  conduct 
to  the  conventional  code  of  morals.  Such  conduct  may  exist 
without  the  realization  of  moral  good  at  all.  Practices  of 
good  manners,  of  good  form,  of  courtesy,  which  every  one  about 
me  regards  as  necessary  to  respectability,  may  not  require  me, 
in  conforming  to  them,  to  put  forth  any  act  of  rational  self- 
determination,  although  in  their  inception  my  ancestors  may 
have  grown  in  manliness  by  their  adoption.  Perhaps  there  was 
a  time  when  for  one  of  my  barbaric  ancestors  to  wash  his  face, 
comb  his  hair,  and  don  decent  apparel  represented  a  deliberate 
weighing  of  the  quality  of  goods  and  a  choice,  perhaps  a  pain- 
ful adoption  of  the  higher.  That  conduct  represented  far 
more  in  him  than  it  does  in  us,  to  whom  those  things  appear  a 
matter  of  course.  Certainly,  at  any  rate  the  man  who  in  his 
inner  life  would  approximate  the  character  of  those  who  lived 
before  him  must  be  expected  to  surpass  them  in  his  external 
conduct. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
DISPOSITION  AND  CHARACTER 

IN  a  previous  chapter,  the  faculties  which  constitute  man  a 
moral  person  were  considered.  They  were  found  to  be  no 
other  than  the  ordinary  human  endowments  of  intellect,  sensi- 
bility, and  will.  There  must  be  a  degree  of  intellectual  power 
capable  of  apprehending  the  end  of  his  being,  and  capable  o£ 
discrimination  in  the  quality  of  goods.  There  must  be  a  degree 
of  will  capable  of  rational  choice,  of  free  self-determination. 
Lacking  either  of  these,  we  could  not  consider  a  man  a  moral 
person.  Though  he  had  the  body  of  a  man,  normal  manhood 
he  has  not,  nor  would  you  think  of  imputing  to  him  either  merit 
or  guilt  in  his  conduct.  And  yet  it  may  be  interesting  to 
inquire,  what,  if  anything,  analogous  to  the  differences  we  per- 
ceive in  the  lives  of  virtuous  and  vicious  men  would  be  possible 
without  the  power  of  choice. 

We  can  conceive  the  existence  of  beings  with  intellect  and 
sensibility  alone.  Such  beings  with  certain  appetences  would 
know  certain  objects  as  suited  to  satisfy  their  sensibilities. 
Their  desires  would  be  excited  by  the  presence  of  those  objects. 
The  objects  being  present,  the  excited  sensibility  is  either 
pleasant  or  painful,  and  the  being  is  impelled  to  act  either  to 
obtain  or  to  shun  the  given  object.  Nor  is  there  any  power  to 
restrain  him,  except  perchance  some  stronger  sensibility  is 
called  into  exercise.  Such  beings,  indeed,  we  believe  the  brutes 
to  be.  Differences  in  conduct  exist  among  such  creatures;  yea, 
differences  in  psychical  life.  There  are  great  differences  in  the 
amount  and  kind  of  satisfaction  which  such  creatures  experience, 
and  certainly  differences  in  the  satisfaction  of  other  beings 
which  might  be  compelled  to  live  with  them.  We  have  every 
possible  variety  in  the  animal  kingdom.  The  tiger  and  the 
calf,  the  lion  and  the  lamb,  the  eagle  and  the  dove  reveal 

63 


64  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

characteristics  as  diverse  as  exist  among  virtuous  and  vicious 
men.  Indeed  they  furnish  us,  by  figures  of  speech,  our  most 
expressive  names  for  the  different  types  of  men.  We  say  of 
one  man  that  he  is  a  lion;  of  another  that  he  is  foxy;  of  another 
that  he  is  a  hog;  of  a  sweet  tempered  girl  that  she  is  a  dove; 
while  our  supreme  contempt  for  some  whimpering  youngster  is 
expressed  by  calling  him  a  calf.  And  yet  in  all  this  diversity  of 
brute  life  there  is  one  thing  in  common.  Each  one  has  exactly 
that  adjustment  of  its  faculties  which  heredity  and  environ- 
ment have  produced.  He  deserves  neither  praise  nor  blame 
for  being  what  he  is.  We  speak,  not  of  his  character  —  that 
word  applied  to  the  brute  will  raise  a  laugh  in  any  company. 
We  do  talk  of  his  disposition,  which  we  define  as  the  actual 
adjustment  of  the  emotions,  passions,  and  appetites  which 
belong  to  any  sentient  and  sensitive  being.  This  definition 
raises  no  inquiry  as  to  how  that  adjustment  came  about. 
ECence  you  may  speak  of  the  disposition  of  the  beast,  of  the 
child,  or  of  the  man.  The  adjustment,  which  we  have  called 
disposition,  may  be  conceived  to  have  remained  just  as  it  has 
taken  shape  under  the  influence  of  heredity  and  environment 
alone,  as  in  the  case  of  the  beast  and  the  infant,  or  as  in  the  case 
of  most  men,  presenting  itself  to  us,  modified  by  few  or  many 
acts  of  volition.  For  this  case  we  have  the  word  character, 
which  has  been  defined  as  "the  attitude  of  the  soul  toward 
righteousness,  made  permanent  by  activities  of  will." 

Some  writers  use  the  words  disposition  and  character  as 
synonyms,  but  make  the  distinction,  above  mentioned,  by 
speaking  of  the  voluntary  and  involuntary  character  and  dis- 
position. We  believe  our  terminology  to  be  preferable.  It 
makes  disposition  a  generic,  and  character  a  specific  term. 
Disposition  passes  into  character  as  soon  as  it  begins  to  be 
modified  by  intelligent  volition. 

It  is  a  truth  of  interest  alike  to  the  philosopher  and  the 
philanthropist  that,  idiots  excepted,  few  men  can  be  found  who 
have  dispositions  just  as  they  have  involuntarily  come  to  be. 
The  motive  powers  have  been  redisposed  as  the  result  of  the 
soul's  self-determining  activity  in  making  choices. 


DISPOSITION  AND   CHARACTER  65 

It  may  interest  the  reader  to  make  a  chart,  illustrating  the 
mingling  of  the  influences  of  heredity,  environment,  and  volition 
in  disposition  and  character.  On  board  or  paper  draw  a 
rectangular  figure  an  inch  broad  and  extending  indefinitely  to 
the  right.  Let  this  space  represent  a  human  life  from  birth  to 
death.  Now  every  one  is  born  with  certain  appetences  in  a 
certain  adjustment  with  each  other.  This  is  his  disposition  as 
heredity  has  made  it.  To  indicate  this  original  disposition,  lay 
on  this  rectangular  space  some  colored  crayon  as  green.  But 


Green— Heredity  Blue  —  Environment  Red— Volition 

the  infant  does  not  live  long  until  its  original  disposition  is 
modified  by  environment.  In  the  treatment  he  receives  at  the 
hands  of  nurse  and  parents  his  education  begins,  and  ever 
after,  varying  influences  are  modifying  and  changing  the  original 
disposition.  Represent  these  changes  by  laying  on  over  the 
original  green  some  crayon  of  another  color,  as  blue.  Com- 
mence near  the  lower  left-hand  corner  and  lay  on  the  blue 
over  more  and  more  of  the  space  and  heavier  as  you  proceed. 
This  too  is  simply  disposition.  You  have  so  far  represented 
the  child  just  as  he  is  made  by  influences  over  which  he  has  no 
control.  But  we  know  that  in  the  normal  development  of 
human  life,  at  some  time  varying  with  different  persons,  but 
certainly  before  maturity  is  reached,  there  are  further  modifi- 
cations of  this  disposition  by  acts  of  choice.  Represent  this 
new  element  by  another  color,  as  red,  and  extend  it  to  the  right 
over  more  and  more  of  the  space.  The  disposition  has  now 
passed  into  character.  Every  man  is  the  product  of  these 
three  factors,  and  it  is  a  grievous  error  to  leave  any  one  of 
them  out  of  account  in  your  analysis  of  any  man's  nature. 
By  varying  the  color  of  your  crayon,  the  amount  of  space  over 
which  you  lay  it,  as  well  as  the  depth  of  shading,  you  may 
represent  almost  any  conceivable  adjustment  of  these  forces. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS 

SOME  writers  give  this  topic  an  undue  amount  of  consideration. 
Others  almost  ignore  the  subject,  as  irrelevant  to  practical 
Ethics.  Our  inquiry  is  not  for  the  origin  of  our  knowledge  of 
these  relations  but  for  the  origin  of  the  relations  themselves. 
Is  it  wrong  to  steal?  We  do  not  here  inquire  how  I  came  by 
my  belief  in  the  wrongness  of  theft..  I  ask  a  deeper  question: 
What  makes  the  wrongness  of  stealing?  Of  course  in  practical 
ethics  the  most  important  consideration  is  the  truth  of  the  propo- 
sition that  theft  is  wrong.  But  is  the  other  unimportant?  Of 
two  kinds  of  food,  we  will  say  that  one  is  nutritious  and  healthy, 
the  other,  though  pleasing  to  the  palate,  is  without  nutriment 
and  induces  disease.  You  might  say  that  the  all-important 
thing  for  me  to  know  is  the  fact  that  this  is  healthy  and  that 
the  other  is  not,  but  will  you  rebuke  the  physiologist  who 
seeks  to  find  what  it  is  in  one  that  makes  it  promote  the  health 
of  the  body  and  what  in  the  other  that  makes  it  injurious?  So 
it  can  not  be  altogether  devoid  of  interest  how  moral  relations 
came  to  be  as  they  are.  This  will  be  the  more  apparent  as  we 
examine  those  theories  which  the  author  believes  to  be  errone- 
ous as  to  the  origin  of  moral  relations. 

President  Porter,  as  prefatory  to  the  discussion,  asks  the 
question:  "Are  moral  relations  real?"  The  argument  is  and  can 
be  little  else  than  a  repetition  of  our  discussion  of  the  reality  of 
duty.  As  a  curiosity  we  might  note  the  fact  that  those  who 
deny  the  reality  of  moral  relations  are  very  few,  and  those  who 
do  so  for  any  but  argumentative  purposes  do  not  sustain  a 
reputation  which  adds  any  weight  to  their  theories.  Read  this 
extract  from  the  father  of  Russian  Nihilism:  "When  you  have 
got  rid  of  your  belief  in  this  priest  begotten  GOD,  and  when, 
moreover,  you  are  convinced  that  your  existence  and  that  of 

66 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS  67 

the  surrounding  world  is  due  to  the  conglomeration  of  atoms, 
in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  gravity  and  attraction,  then  and 
then  only  will  you  have  accomplished  the  first  step  toward 
liberty,  and  you  will  find  less  difficulty  in  ridding  your  minds  of 
that  second  lie  which  tyranny  has  invented.  The  first  lie  is 
God:  the  second  lie  is  "right."  Might  invented  the  fiction 
of  right  in  order  to  insure  and  strengthen  her  reign  —  that 
right  which  she  herself  does  not  heed,  and  which  only  serves  as 
a  barrier  against  any  attacks  which  might  be  made  by  the 
stupid  and  trembling  masses  of  mankind. —  Once  penetratectv 
with  a  clear  conviction  of  your  own  might,  you  will  be  able  to 
destroy  this  mere  notion  of  right.  And  when  you  have  freed 
your  minds  of  the  fear  of  a  God  and  from  that  childish  respect 
for  the  fiction  of  right,  then  all  the  remaining  chains  that  bind 
you,  and  which  are  called  science,  civilization,  property, 
marriage,  morality,  and  justice,  will  snap  asunder  like  threads. 
Let  your  own  happiness  be  your  only  law.  But  in  order  to  get 
this  law  recognized  and  to  bring  about  the  proper  relations 
which  should  exist  between  the  majority  and  minority  of  man- 
kind, you  must  destroy  every  thing  which  exists  in  the  shape  of 
state  or  social  organization.  —  You  must  accustom  yourself  to 
destroy  everything,  the  good  with  the  bad,  for  if  but  an  atom  of 
this  old  world  remains,  the  new  will  never  be  created."  This 
somewhat  extended  quotation  has  been  made  for  two  purposes. 
It  has  quite  a  bearing  on  the  question  of  the  objective  reality  of 
moral  relations.  That  which  no  man  can  deny,  without  con- 
fessing that  he  believes,  is  settled  as  well  as  anything  can  be. 
In  this  case,  as  one  critic  has  remarked,  "The  very  right  whose 
existence  is  denied  is  invoked,  as  the  basis  of  action."  Notice 
that  things  "good"  are  to  be  destroyed  with  the  "bad. "  There 
are  "proper  relations"  which  "should  exist." 

But  the  reader  may  find  here,  either  expressed  or  implied, 
most  of  the  false  theories  as  to  the  origin  of  moral  relations. 
The  man  who  locates  the  origin  of  moral  relations  in  any 
thing  of  less  dignity  than  the  constitution  of  man  himself  is  in 
many  cases  prepared  to  regard  those  relations  lightly,  and  may, 
as  in  this  case,  speculatively  call  in  question  their  reality. 


68  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Let  us  briefly  observe  some  of  the  erroneous  theories  as  to  the 
basis  of  moral  relations : 

1.  Moral  distinctions  are  not  simple  and  arbitrary  creations 
of  the  soul  for  its  own  convenience.    We  are  sometimes  met 
with  the  ill-considered  statement  that  "if  a  man  thinks  any- 
thing to  be  right  it  is  right."    Admitting  that  there  may  be 
things  of  such  indifference  to  human  well  being  that  the  question 
of  personal  sincerity  is  about  all  there  is  in  them,  yet  this  is  not 
true  of  the  great  mass  of  activities  to  which  the  terms  right  and 
wrong  are  applied.    Men  are  compelled  to  believe  that  those 
words  stand  for  external  realities  as  truly  as  do  the  words  by 
which  I  designate  the  objects  of  vision,  and  just  as  I  may  err 
as  to  what  I  see,  yet  not  as  to  the  fact  that  I  see  a  somewhat,  so 
I  may  err  as  to  the  particular  thing  I  call  right  or  wrong. 
Because  I  may  err  in  my  discrimination,  it  does  not  follow  that 
the  distinction  is  fictitious. 

2.  Moral  relations  are  not  the  creation  of  the  civil  ruler. 
That,  in  cases  where  either  of  several  courses  of  conduct  are 
allowable,  the  act  of  the  law  maker  may  lay  upon  me  an  obli- 
gation of  duty,  we  freely  concede,  as  also  that  there  are  obliga- 
tions that  a  man  may  owe  to  society  as  a  citizen,  and  which  it 
is  the  province  of  the  law  maker  to  define;  but  the  civil  law  is 
not  the  general  power,  making  things  right  or  wrong.    It  aims  to 
be  declarative  of  right  but  not  creative.    Few  advocates  of  the 
legal  origin  of  moral  relations  will  fail  in  a  half-hour's  discussion 
to  pronounce  some  law  good  or  bad.    Besides,  we  can  not 
affirm  in  any  case  that  the  law  has  made  something  right 
without  assuming  an  obligation  to  obey  the  law;  and  if"  there 
be  no  law  but  statute,  where  did  the  statute  get  its  authority? 
In  short,  we  are  compelled  to  assume  in  human  nature  in 
society,  a  somewhat  outside  of  the  law,  which  makes  the  law 
obligatory  upon  me.    If  moral  distinctions  have  no  authority 
other  than  the  will  of  the  civil  ruler,  it  might  not  be  difficult 
to  make  an  apology  for  the  Nihilistic  utterance  we  have  quoted. 

3.  It  has  been  urged  that  moral  relations  originate  in  the 
public  opinion  of  communities.    That  what  public  sentiment 
approves  as  right  is  right,  what  it  condemns  is  wrong.    Much 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS  69 

the  same  answer  will  apply  to  this  as  to  the  civil  ruler  theory. 
Customs  and  public  opinion  are  themselves  the  objects  of  our 
moral  approval  or  disapproval.  Those  most  active  in  enforcing 
public  opinion  do  not  presume  to  create  Tightness.  It  is  not 
the  voice  of  a  creator  of  right  which  I  hear,  but  the  tumult  of  a 
multitude  proclaiming  with  one  accord  what  they  all  believe 
the  right  to  be. 

4.  Many  moralists  have  asserted  that  moral  relations  have 
their  origin  in  the  arbitrary  fiat  of  the  Creator;  that  aside  from 
His  decree  there  would  be  no  right  or  wrong.  This  is  the  theory 
of  many  who  adhere  with  devotion  to  the  "authority  of  the 
book."  What  revelation  approves  is  right,  what  it  forbids  is 
wrong,  and  they  are  such  respectively  because  they  are  so 
approved  or  forbidden. 

The  author  approaches  this  subject  reverently.  He  would 
not  "rob  God."  But  reverence  and  devotion  can  have  no 
interest  here  except  in  ascertaining  the  truth.  No  one  has 
appeared,  charged  by  the  Most  High,  with  the  task  of  exalting 
His  name  and  works  in  aught  except  that  which  reason  approves 
as  the  truth.  It  is,  therefore,  with  reverence  and  awe  as  we 
may  suppose  one  of  old  to  have  stood  before  the  burning  bush, 
and  only  because  he  believes  it  the  truth  to  which  careful 
thought  will  lead  you  that  the  author  announces  for  your  con- 
sideration this  thesis:  Moral  relations  do  not  have  their  origin 
in  the  arbitrary  fiat  of  the  Creator.  To  suppose  that  they  do 
would  plunge  us  into  difficulty,  of  which  those  who  pose  as 
special  defenders  of  the  majesty  of  Deity  perhaps  have  not 
dreamed.  It  is  certainly  as  devout  to  defend  the  holiness  of 
Jehovah  as  to  assert  His  power.  To  devout  men  it  is  a  precious 
truth  that  "the  Lord  our  God  is  holy  and  righteous  altogether." 
Such  a  statement  is  at  once  robbed  of  all  significance  if  we 
concede  that  the  arbitrary  fiat  of  Deity  is  the  source  of  right- 
ness.  In  adopting  such  a  theory,  too,  we  deprive  ourselves  of 
one  of  the  best  tests  to  apply  to  any  purported  revelation. 
Moral  relations  are  not  the  subject  of  creation.  In  this  they 
resemble  the  mathematical  relations.  The  sum  of  two  and 
three  is  neither  four  nor  six.  It  is  five  and  nothing  else;  here, 


70  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

on  the  moon,  on  the  planet  Jupiter,  and  beyond  the  milky 
way  —  five  it  is,  and  must  be,  and  that,  not  because  Deity 
willed  it,  but  in  the  very  nature  of  the  case.  The  square  on 
the  hypotenuse  of  a  right  triangle  is  equal  to  the  sum  of  the 
squares  on  the  other  two  sides,  by  an  eternal  necessity,  and  not 
because  that  Deity  made  it  so.  The  writer  once  heard  of  a 
colored  student  in  elementary  Algebra  struggling  to  compre- 
hend why  "minus  by  minus  gives  plus,"  who  asked:  "  What  do 
they  make  it  that  way  for,  anyhow?"  He  was  not  at  all 
embarrassed  by  the  counter  query:  "Where  and  by  whom  do 
you  suppose  these  things  were  made  that  way?"  but  answered 
without  hesitation,  "Why,  I  always  supposed  they  were  made 
in  Chicago."  The  errors  of  our  theological  moralist  and  of 
Africa's  sable  son  originate  in  the  same  mental  shortcoming 
—  an  utter  failure  to  grasp  the  existence  of  necessary  truth. 
We  commend  to  the  man  so  jealous  for  the  power  of  Jehovah 
the  words  of  a  great  moralist,  who,  whatever  his  other  short- 
comings, has  never  been  accused  of  irreverence:  "The  Lord 
possessed  me  in  the  beginning  of  his  way,  before  his  works  of 
old,  I  was  set  up  from  everlasting,  from  the  beginning,  or  ever 
the  earth  was.  When  there  were  no  depths,  I  was  brought 
forth;  when  there  were  no  fountains  abounding  with  water. 
Before  the  mountains  were  settled,  before  the  hills  was  I 
brought  forth:  while  as  yet  he  had  not  made  the  earth,  nor 
the  fields,  nor  the  highest  part  of  the  dust  of  the  world.  When 
he  prepared  the  heavens  /  was  there:  when  he  set  a  compass 
upon  the  face  of  the  depth;  when  he  established  the  clouds 
above:  when  he  strengthened  the  fountains  of  the  deep:  when 
he  gave  to  the  sea  his  decree,  that  the  waters  should  not  pass 
his  commandment:  then  I  was  with  him,  as  one  brought  up 
with  him:  and  I  was  daily  his  delight,  rejoicing  always  before 
him."  No,  it  is  not  irreverent  to  say,  with  bared  brow  and 
uncovered  feet,  that  if  in  creation's  morn  God  had  sent  one  of 
the  sons  of  light  flying  through  space  on  the  hypotenuse  of  a 
right  triangle,  whose  sides  were  "a"  and  "b,"  the  distance 
traveled  would  have  been  V"a2"+"b2"  and  Omnipotence 
absolutely  could  not  shorten  that  distance  by  one  hair's  breadth. 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS  71 

Now  to  suppose  moral  relations  capable  of  being  created  at 
the  fiat  of  a  will  is  to  suppose  that  it  were  possible  for  them  to 
have  been  otherwise,  and  it  is  absolutely  inconceivable  that  in 
their  essential  nature  they  could  be  otherwise  than  they  are. 
Let  any  one  who  advocates  the  divine  origin  of  moral  rela- 
tions try  to  imagine  those  relations  reversed.  Here  are  two 
men  in  such  situation  toward  each  other  that  we  say  a  certain 
act  is  due  from  one  to  the  other;  could  any  fiat  of  a  will,  circum- 
stances remaining  the  same,  make  that  duty  not  to  be?  Take 
the  case  of  the  wounded  Jew  by  the  roadside;  we  commend  the 
conduct  of  the  good  Samaritan,  and  condemn  that  of  the  priest 
and  Levite.  The  human  mind  absolutely  cannot  believe  it 
possible  that  any  voice  from  the  skies  could  render  the  obliga- 
tions in  that  case  different  from  what  we  now  understand 
them  to  be.  We  cannot  believe  that  any  decree  of  Omnipotence 
could  make  the  indifference  of  the  two  to  be  praiseworthy  or  the 
neighborly  conduct  of  the  Samaritan  to  be  culpable.  One 
course  of  conduct  expresses  "good  will"  and  the  other  evil 
will,  and  we  absolutely  challenge  any  living  man,  however  pious, 
to  say  that  he  believes  that  God  could  make  the  evil  will 
meritorious  and  the  good  will  reprehensible.  It  is  common  for 
theologians  to  evade  this  by  saying  that  we  have  supposed  an 
inconceivable  thing,  because  God  is  good  and  he  will  not  decree 
an  unrighteous  thing.  Very  true,  but  it  concedes  the  point  for 
which  we  are  contending.  There  is  a  Tightness,  in  the  very 
nature  of  things,  to  which  Jehovah  conforms  all  the  activities 
of  His  will,  and,  in  saying  that  he  cannot  make  the  evil  will 
right,  we  are  not  guilty  of  any  more  irreverence  than  that 
other  writer  who  said  that  "it  is  impossible  for  God  to  lie." 

The  confusion  on  this  point  is  an  example  of  the  failure  to 
distinguish  between  the  "reason  for  being"  and  the  "reason  for 
knowing."  If  it  is  once  assumed  as  a  settled  fact  that  God  is 
good  and  holy,  then  the  will  of  Deity,  when  known,  may  well 
be  with  men  an  end  of  controversy.  It  is  a  proof  of  Tightness, 
but  not  the  cause  of  Tightness.  I  may  better  believe  that  God 
commands  a  thing  because  it  is  right,  not  that  it  is  right 
because  he  commands  it.  The  error  is  close  kin  to  that  of 


72  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

some  religionists,  who  insist  that  a  thing  is  true  because  it  is 
in  the  Bible,  the  better  view  being,  that  it  is  written  in  the 
Bible  because  it  is  true. 

We  have  now  answered  negatively  the  inquiry  as  to  the 
ground  of  moral  relations.  We  have  found  that  the  Tightness 
of  conduct  is  not  made  such  by  public  opinion,  by  the  civil  law, 
or  by  the  arbitrary  fiat  of  Deity.  The  positive  answer  is 
implied  in  what  we  have  already  observed,  and  we  affirm, 
without  fear  of  successful  contradiction,  that  the  real  ground 
of  moral  relations  is  in  the  nature  and  constitution  of  man.  If 
you  were  to  ask  the  physiologist  on  what  ground  he  affirms 
one  kind  of  food  to  be  healthier  than  another,  he  would  not 
think  of  looking  outside  the  human  body  for  his  answer.  Ask 
the  moral  philosopher  what  it  is  that  makes  a  given  course  of 
conduct  right,  and  he  errs  if  he  goes  anywhere  outside  the 
nature  and  constitution  of  man.  Place  men,  constituted  as 
they  are,  in  certain  relations  to  each  other,  and  truth,  honesty, 
and  sympathy  are  due  from  one  to  the  other,  not  because 
public  opinion,  civil  law,  or  divine  fiat  require  them,  but 
because  the  constitution  of  human  nature  makes  them  the 
fitting  things.  Their  manifestation  accords  with  the  most  com- 
plete development  of  manhood.  Every  classical  student 
remembers  the  "dei"  in  the  Greek,  the  "opportet"  in  Latin. 
Impersonal  verbs  —  what  trouble  they  gave  us  in  our  student 
days!  But  the  framers  of  those  old  languages  builded  wisely 
when  they  framed  a  word  which  enables  us  to  say  of  some 
course  of  conduct  that  "it  befits  a  man."  Put  the  emphasis  on 
man.  Attention  was  called  to  the  importance  of  not  con- 
founding the  cause  of  knowing  with  the  cause  of  being.  It  is 
in  order  to  turn  our  attention  for  a  few  moments  to  the  "cause 
of  knowing."  How  does  a  man  know  moral  relations?  Having 
seen  that  they  originate  in  the  nature  and  constitution  of  man, 
we  will  not  look  elsewhere  for  them.  But  all  within  the 
human  constitution  there  are  two  directions  in  which  we  may 
make  our  observations.  We  may  examine  the  lives  of  men 
in  society,  and  observe  how  individuals  are  affected  by  each 
other's  activities.  ^This  is  the  method  of  consequences.  We 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  RELATIONS  73 

call  those  activities  objectively  right  which  promote  human 
well  being.  Moralists  must  make  these  observations,  and  yet 
they  may  make  many  mistakes  and  many  errors  in  their 
inferences.  It  is  difficult  to  hold  the  well  being  of  all  men  of 
equal  worth  in  such  a  calculation.  We  are  inclined  to  consider 
the  well  being  of  some  classes  (our  own  most  certainly)  to  the 
exclusion  of  others.  Selfishness  hides  itself  under  the  mask  of 
benevolence.  It  is  difficult,  too,  to  see  the  remote  consequences 
of  some  measures,  and  it  is  the  sum  of  consequences  with  which 
the  utilitarian  moralist  must  deal. 

But  there  is  a  direction  we  may  give  to  our  observations 
where  our  conclusions  are  much  more  certain.  As  soon  as  a 
man  looks  within  himself  he  must  judge  some  kinds  of  feeling, 
choosing  and  doing,  to  be  higher  than  others  —  to  be  more  in 
accord  with  his  peculiar  human  endowment.  If  you  question, 
how  does  he  know  it  to  be  higher  and  more  worthy  of  manhood, 
we  answer  that  you  must  expect  to  reach  a  place  where  the  judg- 
ment is  intuitive.  There  are  facts  in  all  knowledge  which  are 
intuitively  discerned.  You  never  think  of  affirming  that  this 
color  is  brighter  than  that,  or  that  one  sound  is  stronger, 
higher,  or  lower  than  another  on  any  other  authority  than  that 
of  the  soul's  power  to  discern  color  and  sound.  There  are  such 
intuitive  judgments  in  our  moral  consciousness.  A  man  cannot 
look  within  himself  and  compare  with  each  other  the  various 
emotions  and  sentiments  which  he  finds  there  without  making 
some  moral  judgment.  He  cannot  compare  love  with  hate,  self- 
service  with  self-sacrifice,  unbridled  appetite  with  restraint, 
without  affirming,  and  that  in  no  doubtful  tones,  which  is  the 
higher  —  without  saying  which  befits  the  man.  And  you  need 
look  for  no  ground  for  his  judgment  other  than  this,  that  the 
soul  finds  itself  making  these  discriminations.  Search  among 
your  acquaintances  for  an  individual  of  mature  years  who  can 
not  do  this,  in  such  darkness  that  the  eyes  of  his  understanding 
do  not  discern  the  differences  between  the  several  sensibilities, 
—  one  whose  intellect,  on  reflection,  does  not  affirm  one  to  be 
higher,  i.e.,  more  fitting  his  manhood  than  another;  when 
you  find  him,  if  you  ever  do,  we  will  count  him  a  freak — a 


74  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

monstrosity.  You  may  well  hesitate  to  call  him  a  moral 
person  at  all.  He  is  a  "reprobate."  Would  that  our  theo- 
logians had  grasped  the  significance  of  that  term.  It  means 
"void  of  judgment." 

You  will  perceive,  if  our  observations  are  correct,  that  the 
human  soul  in  its  moral  life  makes  its  judgments  under  the 
category  of  design.  If  obliged  to  say  why  it  affirms  one  thing 
right  rather  than  another,  it  is  the  adaptation  of  that  thing  to 
promote  the  end  —  human  excellence.  The  soul  judges  that 
end  by  the  capacities  it  finds  within  itself,  especially  by  its 
higher  capacities.  Whatever  capacity  there  is  which  is  pecu- 
liarly human  we  infer  is  designed  for  cultivation,  rather  than 
that  capacity  which  man  may  have  in  common  with  the  beast. 


CHAPTER  XV 
THE  EXTERNAL  ACTIONS 

WE  have  seen  that  moral  quality  is  pre-eminently  affirmed  of  a 
man's  choices.  We  might  close  our  discussion  here  if  man  were 
an  isolated,  pure  spirit.  The  end  of  his  being  would  seem  to 
have  been  met  when  he  would  choose  for  himself  the  highest 
good  which  his  nature  fitted  him  to  enjoy.  But  man  is  not 
such  a  being.  Spirit  though  he  is,  he  is  held  down  to  a  material 
organism  which  solicits  his  care,  and  in  relation  to  which  he 
must  live  during  his  earthly  existence.  Moreover,  he  is  sur- 
rounded by  beings  constituted  like  himself,  and  is  fitted  by  his 
very  constitution  to  live  in  their  society,  to  grow  and  develop 
in  conjunction  with  them. 

No  great  amount  of  development  has  ever  been  attained 
apart  from  one's  fellows.  Though  there  is  a  place  in  human 
development  and  work  for  quiet  and  temporary  seclusion, 
the  history  of  the  world  will  show  us  the  mistake  of  those  who, 
in  India  or  in  Europe,  the  followers  of  Gautama  or  the  dis- 
ciples of  Jesus,  have  supposed  that  the  virtuous  life  was  one  of 
solitude.  Every  impulse  of  the  soul  is  an  impulse  to  act  with 
reference  to  something  or  somebody,  and  there  is  little  of  human 
action  that  does  not  affect  the  well  being  of  a  fellow  creature. 
Were  one  to  undertake  to  live  a  life  of  inaction,  there  are  those 
who  would  have  a  right  to  complain  of  his  inertness.  It  would 
not  be  sufficient  that  the  inner  impulses  of  the  soul  should  be 
holy.  Indeed  those  impulses  are  very  defective  unless  they 
are  accompanied  by  a  desire  for  expression  in  appropriate 
action.  Following  to  some  extent  the  outline  of  President 
Porter,  we  note  in  regard  to  the  external  actions  that: 

i.  They  are  necessary  to  execute  the  choices — to  make 
them  effective.  "Why  call  ye  me  Lord,  Lord,  and  do  not  the 
things  that  I  say"  expresses  the  universal  lack  of  faith  in  a 

75 


76  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

choice  that  does  not  issue  in  appropriate  action.  It  is  said  that 
in  some  provinces  in  Russia  the  hungry  traveler  who  solicits 
a  morsel  of  bread  is  met  with  the  response,  "May  heaven  feed 
you."  No  number  of  such  blessings  would  satisfy  a  single 
pang  of  hunger. 

2.  It  is  by  external  acts  that  men  confirm  themselves  in 
the  choices  which  they  have  made.    This  psychical  fact  fur- 
nishes a  reason  for  the  ritual  of  all  fraternal  orders,  and  for  the 
initiatory  rites  of  all  religions.    It  explains  the  insistence  of 
evangelists  and  temperance  reformers  that  their  auditors  shall 
do  something.    Many  a  man  has  been  saved  to  a  better  life, 
whose  awakened  emotions  would  have  carried  him  only  a  few 
hours,  had  not  some  trifling  act,  as  "kneeling  at  the  mourner's 
bench"  or  "standing  up  to  be  counted,"  confirmed  a  feeble 
resolution  and  strengthened  a  feeble  will. 

It  is  true  that  "as  a  man  thinketh  in  his  heart  so  is  he." 
It  is  proper  to  warn  men  against  harboring  secret  sin.  It  is 
right  to  turn  the  eyes  of  men  in  upon  themselves  that  they  may 
see  what  manner  of  men  they  are;  but  no  moral  teacher,  who 
remembers  the  effect  of  the  external  act  upon  the  man  himself, 
will  ever  be  found  telling  men  that  it  is  just  as  bad  to  think, 
feel,  or  wish  an  evil  thing  as  to  do  it.  Such  doctrine  is  philo- 
sophical error  and  might  well  be  considered  religious  heresy, 
more  mischievous  than  some  things  which  pass  under  that  name. 

3.  The  external  actions  manifest  the  purposes.    Let  any 
great  purpose  be  formed  and  a  man  is  at  once  impelled  to  make 
it  known.     So  strong  is  this  impulse  that  nothing  save  politic 
reasons  can  suppress  it.    True  "he  that  doeth  evil"  (or  even 
that  which  is  considered  evil)  may  hate  the  light,  but  "he  that 
doeth  truth  cometh  to  the  light  that  his  deeds  may  be  made 
manifest."    Now  there  is  no  way  to  manifest  a  purpose  except 
in  some  external  activity.     Hence  the  importance  of  making 
the  bodily  activities,  such  as  may  manifest  appropriately  the 
purposes  which  have  been  formed.     Indeed  it  is  only  as  an  act 
is  interpreted  as  manifesting  a  purpose  that  it  can  be  said  to 
have  moral  quality  at  all;  that  is  that  it  can  be  considered  as 
indicating  the  character  of  the  actor.    The  very  same  external 


THE  EXTERNAL  ACTIONS  77 

act,  even  when  voluntary,  has  very  different  moral  qualities, 
as  in  diverse  circumstances  it  manifests  diverse  purposes. 
In  unearthing  the  ruins  of  an  ancient  city,  the  rubbish  was 
cleared  from  a  ruined  temple.  An  altar  was  found,  and  by  it 
a  pot  half  filled  with  incense,  as  it  had  been  left  centuries  before. 
A  company  of  Christian  visitors  thought  to  reproduce  as  nearly 
as  possible  the  forms  of  the  old  pagan  worship.  They  kindled 
a  fire,  and  one  of  them  threw  a  cup  of  the  incense  on  the  embers 
and  all  stood  by  and  saw  it  consumed.  Contrast  this  with  a 
scene  that  for  aught  we  know  may  have  been  acted  before  that 
same  altar,  centuries  before :  A  man  is  accused  of  being  a  Chris- 
tian— heinous  offense — and  refuses  to  answer.  He  is  brought 
before  the  altar  and  a  cup  of  incense  thrust  into  his  hand,  he  is 
bidden  to  throw  it  on  the  coals.  He  refuses  and  he  will  die 
rather  than  yield,  and  centuries  of  Christian  civilization  ap- 
plaud his  "obstinacy."  The  external  act  is  the  same  in  the 
two  cases,  the  difference  lay  in  the  purposes  of  which  the  act  was 
the  manifestation. 

4.  It  is  by  the  external  acts  that  good  choices  are  matured 
into  habits.  From  the  dignity  which  we  have  claimed  for  the 
will,  some  may  conceive  the  thought  that  a  state  of  choice 
making  is  ultimate  in  human  life.  Not  so.  To  be  compelled 
to  deliberate,  to  balance  in  the  mind  the  quality  of  goods,  and 
then  to  make  choices,  perhaps  against  the  pressure  of  energetic 
sensibilities,  is  not  a  state  in  which  a  man  can  rest.  Acts  of 
choosing  are  means,  not  ends.  By  making  choices  and  executing 
them,  man  at  last  renders  choice  unnecessary.  That  activity, 
which  at  one  time  required  a  choice  for  its  inception  and  execu- 
tion, comes  to  be  done  almost  automatically.  Choices  have 
been  matured  into  habits. 

It  is  no  doubt  desirable,  if  possible,  to  have  some  rules  for 
the  external  actions.  To  form  codes  for  the  regulation  of  human 
conduct  is  a  necessary  part  of  the  work  of  the  moral  teacher 
and  of  the  law  maker  but  it  must  be  said  that,  if  such  specific 
codes  are  made  to  displace  or  conceal  the  great  underlying 
principles  of  moral  philosophy,  good  will  and  good  morals  give 
way  to  the  forms  of  a  senseless  etiquette  and  a  hypocritical 


78  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

ritualism.  The  scribes  and  Pharisees  would  not  go  into  the 
judgment  hall  of  Pilate,  lest  they  should  be  defiled,  but  they 
could  clamor  for  the  blood  of  an  innocent  man.  Some  eastern 
brigands  have  no  scruples  about  cutting  a  man's  throat,  but 
would  omit  no  detail  of  politeness  in  saluting  him. 

There  are  few  if  any  external  acts  of  which  it  can  be  said  that 
they  are  universally  required.  The  following  has  been  sug- 
gested as  a  general  rule  for  our  guidance  in  regard  to  the  external 
activities:  "Whatever  action  is  necessary  to  manifest  or  to 
confirm  a  right  purpose  must  be  performed;  and  one  must  care- 
fully refrain  from  an  act  which,  either  in  its  inherent  nature  or 
in  its  setting,  is  fitted  to  be  the  manifestation  of  an  evil  pur- 
pose. "  It  is  true  that  this  rule  gives  great  latitude  to  individual 
judgment,  but  I  doubt  the  possibility  of  formulating  one  any 
more  definite.  General  as  it  seems,  it  would  if  adopted  put 
backbone  into  many  a  timid  citizen.  The  Australian  ballot  is 
a  good  arrangement  in  many  respects,  but  it  is  a  confession  of 
the  weakness  or  cowardice  of  a  large  number  of  voters.  It 
proposes  that  men  may  hold  purposes,  and  make  choices,  and 
not  manifest  them  except  in  the  mass. 

You  know  some  evil  intrenched  in  society.  You  may  not 
be  able  to  uproot  it,  but  you  must  manifest  your  attitude 
toward  it,  and  that  attitude  must  be  one  of  antagonism,  al- 
though our  rule  will  allow  you  great  latitude  as  to  the  most 
appropriate  action  in  which  to  manifest  that  hostility.  Drunk- 
enness and  debauchery  are  evils  so  intrenched  that  no  one  can 
hold  me  responsible  for  their  continuance  to-morrow.  Our 
rule  will  allow  me  great  discretion  in  the  selection  of  the  means 
by  which  I  will  manifest  a  right  purpose  regarding  them. 
Very  clearly,  however,  that  right  purpose  will  not  be  manifested 
in  renting  property  for  places  of  evil  resort,  nor  in  signing  a 
petition  of  consent  for  a  saloon. 


CHAPTER  XVI 
THE  MORAL  FEELINGS 

THE  moral  consciousness  includes  the  exercise  of  several 
peculiar  sensibilities.  In  previous  discussions,  we  had  occasion 
to  observe  them  in  part.  A  more  careful  treatment  is  in  place 
here.  The  moral  feelings  are  five  in  number:  obligation,  self- 
approval,  self-reproach,  merit  and  demerit.  The  first  three 
are  related  to  one's  own  conduct,  the  last  two  to  the  conduct 
of  others.  They  have  one  characteristic  in  common.  They 
all  follow  the  direction  of  the  moral  judgment.  As  to  courses 
of  conduct  which  are  accounted  indifferent,  that  is  without 
moral  quality,  it  is  impossible  that  these  emotions  should  arise. 
We  have  said  "accounted  indifferent"  for  the  objective  right- 
ness,  the  absolute  fitness  of  an  act  has  nothing  whatever  to  do 
in  determining  my  feeling  regarding  it.  Whatever  my  judgment 
approves,  however  erroneously,  as  the  fitting  thing  to  be  done 
in  any  particular  case,  that  thing  I  feel  bound,  obligated  to  do, 
and  will  approve  or  reproach  myself  or  praise  or  blame  another 
for  doing  or  not  doing.  The  feeling  of  obligation  is  unique; 
its  phenomena  can  only  be  discussed  by  appealing  to  the  con- 
sciousness of  your  auditor.  He  may  not  have  felt  it  on  the 
same  occasions  that  your  have,  but  he  has  had  it  about  some, 
probably  about  many,  things.  The  best  attempt  to  describe 
it  was  made  by  him  who  gave  it  its  name,  "  obligation, "  literally 
a  binding  to.  The  man  with  this  feeling  is  bound,  tied  to  some- 
thing, and  can  not  get  away.  If  he  divert  his  attention  for  a 
time  he  is  sure  to  be  pulled  up  again,  like  the  beast  at  the  end 
of  his  tether,  and  feel  the  force  of  that  everlasting  "you  must." 
Very  expressively  Kant  spoke  of  the  "categorical  imperative.  "- 
Do  not  construe  these  words  to  impIy'^pEysical  compulsion. 
The  man  with  several  courses  of  conduct  open  to  him,  with 
several  goods  present,  either  to  sense  or  to  the  imagination  t 

79 


80  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

each  one  exerting  the  pull  of  its  own  particular  allurement, 
—  this  man  is  a  free,  self -determining  person,  knowing  full  well 
that  he  does  not  "have  to,"  yet  he  feels  toward  one  course  of 
conduct  the  added  pull  of  an  eternal  "ought." 

Many  of  the  things  herein  said  of  the  sense  of  obligation 
are  equally  true  of  the  feelings  of  self  approval  and  self  reproach. 
In  time  these  feelings  follow  the  choice  or  act,  while  the  sense 
of  obligation  preceded  it.  Like  it  they  follow  the  course  of  the 
moral  judgment  without  any  regard  to  the  objective  correctness 
of  that  judgment.  If  that  judgment  was  an  error,  it  may 
occur  that  a  man  congratulates  himself  on  conduct  most  mis- 
chievous to  society  or  hurtful  to  himself;  or  he  may  reproach 
himself  for  an  act  which  as  a  matter  of  fact  was  the  fitting  one 
to  be  performed.  These  feelings  can  not  be  resolved  into  the 
love  of  applause  or  the  dread  of  censure.  It  is  not  because 
the  multitude  applauds  that  the  man  approves,  nor  because 
it  hisses  that  he  reproaches  himself.  All  that  these  can  do 
is  for  a  time  to  divert  his  attention  from  his  own  opinion  of 
himself.  The  daring  leader  of  a  band  of  wicked  men,  knowing 
full  well  that  his  conduct  is  wicked,  yet  applauded  by  his 
companions,  does  not  really  approve  himself.  The  praise  of 
his  associates  displaces  in  his  mind  and  defers  for  a  time  the 
feeling  of  reproach  he  would  otherwise  experience.  In  the 
pleasure  of  their  approval  he  forgets  the  violence  he  has  done 
to  his  own  better  nature,  but  the  reproach  is  sure  to  come 
when  he  comes  to  himself. 

Perhaps  the  best  that  can  be  done  in  accounting  for  these 
feelings  is  something  like  this:  I  am  naturally  pleased  with 
whatever  is  the  occasion  of  good  to  me,  and  displeased  with 
that  which  I  know  to  be  the  occasion  of  evil  to  me.  Now  in 
whatever  degree  I  know  myself  the  author  of  that  good  or  evil, 
in  that  degree  I  am  pleased  or  displeased  with  myself.  This 
explains  the  peculiar  tenacity  with  which  the  feeling  of  self 
reproach  clings  to  us.  The  feeling  is  different  from  the  grief 
over  inevitable  calamity  or  over  evil  brought  on  us  by  the  con- 
duct of  others.  "Through  my  fault,  my  most  grievous  fault" 
is  the  cry  of  the  remorse  stricken  soul. 


THE  MORAL  FEELINGS  Si 

The  senses  of  merit  and  demerit  differ  from  those  we  have 
been  considering  in  that  they  are  excited  in  us  by  the  conduct 
of  others.  We  see  a  man  perform  a  deed  of  heroic  self  sacrifice 
or  of  self -forgetful  generosity  and  we  are  pleased  with  it. 
We  feel  moved  to  express  our  approval,  and  to  reward  the  doer, 
and  if  this  feeling  is  not  inhibited  by  one  of  self  interest,  we  are 
likely  to  look  about  us  for  some  way  in  which  to  reward  him. 
We  see  or  hear  of  a  deed  of  cruelty,  of  moral  turpitude,  we  are 
not  only  shocked  by  it,  we  feel  that  the  doer  deserves  to  suffer 
and  very  likely  that  it  would  gratify  us  to  make  him  smart  for 
it.  There  is  some  difficulty  in  the  study  of  these  feelings  because 
they  mingle  so  readily  with  other  emotions.  How  my  sense 
of  the  offender's  turpitude  is  intensified,  if  his  pernicious  action 
has  been  directed  against  me — big  me.  From  this  mingling 
of  the  selfish  with  the  moral  feelings,  have  followed  several 
interesting  consequences:  (i)  Men  are  much  more  inclined 
to  punish  their  enemies  than  to  reward  their  friends.  To 
reward  a  man  in  moderation,  for  a  good  deed  does  not  hurt 
him,  while  my  own  self  interest  will  act  as  a  check  upon  a  too 
substantial  manifestation  of  my  approbation;  but  in  the  pun- 
ishment of  an  evil  doer,  my  selfishness  re-enforces  the  moral 
sentiment  of  demerit,  and  my  action  is  likely  to  be  excessive. 
(2)  Following  from  the  above,  it  has  been  found  necessary 
that  society  should  take  the  punishment  of  evil  doers  out  of 
private  hands,  while  leaving  men  free  to  reward  their  friends 
to  their  complete  satisfaction.  Let  us  carefully  distinguish 
between  the  moral  feeling  of  demerit  and  the  desire  for  venge- 
ance or  the  beastly  craving  for  cruelty  which  ordinarily  lies 
dormant  in  human  nature,  but  on  occasion,  as  in  the  case  of 
mobs,  leaps  forth  like  a  hundred  furies  from  the  pit.  With 
this  word  of  caution,  it  may  be  said  that  the  sense  of  demerit 
in  the  presence  of  wrong  doing  is  right,  and  the  human  soul 
in  whom  it  is  wanting  or  weak  is  sadly  defective.  It  is  to 
the  credit  of  human  nature  that  though  the  sense  of  demerit 
mingles  easily  and  often  mischievously  with  the  egoistic 
emotions,  it  is  not  dependent  on  self-love.  It  is  aroused  by 
the  knowledge  of  deeds  of  violence  and  shame  in  the  remote 


82  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

corners  of  the  earth.  The  excitement  in  this  country  over  the 
Turkish  atrocities  in  Armenia,  and  our  indignation  on  the 
occasion  of  the  Dreyfus  trial  are  examples.  Here  again  the 
feeling  follows  the  moral  judgment.  It  has  often  occurred  that 
men  have  blamed  their  fellows  for  the  noblest  deeds  and  have 
praised  them  for  deeds  of  the  greatest  turpitude,  but  always 
on  an  erroneous  moral  judgment.  I  doubt  the  ability  of  even 
a  fiend  to  approve  vice,  considered  as  such,  or  to  regard  virtue, 
as  such,  blameworthy.  This  is  illustrated  in  the  absurd 
stories  always  circulated  about  the  victims  of  persecution. 
Socrates  was  charged  with  impiety  and  with  corrupting  the 
youth.  "We  found  this  fellow  perverting  the  nation  and  for- 
bidding to  give  tribute  to  Caesar,"  was  a  false  judgment,  not 
so  much  invented  to  further  the  case  before  Pilate,  as  willingly 
believed  in  order  that  they  might  justify  themselves  in  crying 
"Crucify  him!"  In  Russia,  Semitic  hate  finds  it  necessary  to 
excuse  itself  for  its  blood-curdling  outrages  by  lending  a  ready 
ear  to  the  absurd  stories  that  the  Jews  hold  cannibal  feasts 
at  which  infants  stolen  from  Christian  homes  are  choice  delica- 
cies. The  moral  feeling  of  demerit  is  impossible  against  a 
good  act  considered  as  such,  and  it  is  impossible  for  it  to  stand 
alone.  It  must  lean  upon  a  moral  judgment,  even  if  it  be  one 
made  to  order. 

The  importance  of  the  moral  feelings  in  the  economy  of 
human  life  will  be  more  and  more  apparent  as  we  proceed.  It 
is  not  enough  for  a  man's  development  in  character  that  he 
have  an  acute  intellect,  to  discern  the  quality  of  goods,  or  that 
he  have  the  power  of  well  sustained  choice.  There  is  a  certain 
equipment  of  the  sensibilities  which  is  indispensable  to  moral 
manhood.  We  sometimes  hear  of  men  of  "strong  convictions. " 
The  phrase  is  not  happily  chosen,  but  by  it  is  meant,  men  of 
intense  moral  feelings. 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  CONSCIENCE 

THERE  is  no  concept  in  the  whole  range  of  philosophy  which  is 
held  more  vaguely  than  the  one  indicated  by  the  term  Con- 
science. Not  long  since  a  lecturer  of  national  repute  declared 
that,  in  addition  to  intellect,  sensibility,  and  will,  man  is  endowed 
with  conscience.  Evidently  he  was  of  that  school  who  believe 
in  a  special  moral  sense.  Much  of  the  talk  concerning  con- 
science has  been  couched  in  figurative  language.  We  hear  of 
it  as  the  "inner  light";  as  the  "voice  of  God  in  the  soul";  and 
yet  every  power  to  discern  truth  can  with  equal  propriety  be 
spoken  of  under  these  metaphors. 

Moralists  have  often  felt  compelled  to  defend  conscience 
against  the  charge  of  tyrannies  practiced  and  crimes  committed 
in  its  name.  They  have  sought  definitions  which  would  so 
limit  its  functions  that  they  might  claim  for  it  infallibility. 
They  have  held  that  "like  the  needle  it  will  always  point  to 
the  pole"  (sure  enough,  unless  diverted  by  a  bed  of  ore,  an 
electric  current,  or  a  sunspot). 

Perhaps  all  the  erroneous  theories  may  be  best  answered  by 
setting  forth  at  once  what  we  believe  will  be  found  to  be  the 
truth.  We  have  no  occasion  to  invent  a  special  moral  sense. 
We  have  seen  that  all  man's  moral  activities  and  experiences 
may  be  referred  to  the  operation  of  the  ordinary  human  faculties 
employed,  it  is  true,  on  a  special  subject  matter.  We  have  seen 
that  when  from  our  moral  experiences  there  have  been  elimi- 
nated the  parts  severally  belonging  to  intellect,  sensibility,  and 
will  there  is  nothing  left  to  assign  to  a  special  faculty.  Unless 
we  are  prepared  to  discard  the  term  conscience  entirely,  we 
must  use  it  as  a  collective  term  for  several  of  the  activities  of 
man's  moral  life.  This  will  appear  to  be  the  proper  course. 
True  we  could  discuss  every  action  of  the  human  soul  in  its 

83 


84  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

moral  experiences  and  not  use  the  word  at  all.  In  fact  we 
have  well  nigh  done  so.  But  the  term  conscience  is  too  well 
wrought  into  the  language  both  of  the  philosopher  and  of  the 
man  of  affairs  to  be  discarded.  We  have  no  wish  to  discard  it. 
We  would  rescue  it  from  the  obscurity  which  hangs  around  it. 
It  is  desirable  to  have  a  collective  term  for  the  intellectual  and 
sensitive  experiences  of  the  moral  life,  and  there  is  no  better 
term  than  conscience.  We  suggest  this  definition:  con- 
science is  the  human  soul  discerning  and  enforcing  moral 
relations. 

Thus  defined  conscience  will  be  seen  to  comprise  activities 
of  the  reflective  intellect,  and  of  the  sensibilities  which  we  have 
called  the  moral  feelings.  In  our  discussion  of  the  topic  of  the 
last  chapter,  it  can  hardly  have  escaped  notice  that  many  of  the 
experiences  to  which  we  gave  attention  were  those  which  in  the 
language  of  every  day  life  are  ascribed  to  the  conscience.  No 
objection  can  be  urged  against  the  employment  of  a  single  term 
to  designate  a  complex  experience.  What  we  call  sense  per- 
ception is  a  complex  act,  involving  an  act  of  sensibility  in 
sensation  and  of  intellect  in  perception  proper.  The  great 
diversities  observed  in  the  activities  called  conscience  in  differ- 
ent men  may  be  traced  to  differences  in  one  or  the  other  of  its 
component  elements.  We  are  aware  that  there  are  those  who 
would  object  to  our  definition.  There  are  works  on  moral 
philosophy  which  limit  the  term  conscience  to  the  sense  of 
obligation  to  do  that  which  the  moral  judgment  has  approved, 
with  the  following  feelings  of  reproach  or  approval.  We  can 
discern  no  reason  why  the  moral  feelings  rather  than  the  moral 
judgment  should  have  the  name,  and,  as  common  usage  has 
employed  the  term  for  both  activities,  we  shall  so  use  it  and 
shall  treat  the  conscience  in  both  its  intellectual  and  sensitive 
aspects.  Excellence  of  conscience  may  be  affirmed  of  conscience 
in  either  of  its  elements,  and  is  emphatically  affirmed  if  we  find 
existing  together  a  high  degree  of  power  to  discern  and  of  the 
power  to  enforce.  In  like  manner  conscience  may  be  defective, 
either  in  a  lack  of  intellectual  discrimination  or  in  a  feebleness 
in  the  exercise  of  the  moral  feelings. 


THE  CONSCIENCE  85 

The  man  with  the  good  conscience  is  he  whose  intellect 
clearly  perceives  the  fitness  of  things  between  himself  and 
other  beings,  and  whose  moral  feelings  are  easily  aroused  and 
keenly  alive.  He  accurately  discerns  what  right  is  and  feels 
himself  mightily  impelled  to  do  it,  and,  if  through  great  tempta- 
tion he  has  failed  to  make  the  correct  choice,  his  grief  and 
humiliation  are  agonizing.  In  common  parlance  the  good  con- 
science is  often  confused  with  the  clear  conscience.  Evidently 
a  distinction  should  be  made.  The  clear  conscience  is  affirmed 
of  the  man  who  simply  has  no  feeling  of  self-reproach.  This 
condition  may  result  from  either  of  several  causes.  The  man 
may  have  studiously  set  his  face  toward  the  performance  of 
every  duty  and  directed  his  energies  to  the  discovery  of  what 
duty  might  be.  In  this  case  the  clear  conscience  is  much  to  be 
desired.  But  evidently  this  absence  of  self-reproach  might 
result  from  a  dull  moral  perception,  or  from  a  hardened  sensi- 
bility. In  this  case  to  have  a  clear  conscience  is  a  great  mis- 
fortune. We  call  to  mind  an  old  man  awakened  in  a  religious 
revival  who  persisted  in  visiting  the  saloon  and  drinking  beer. 
He  was  astonished  and  indignant  when  he  found  his  conduct  a 
matter  of  criticism.  Of  course  he  drank  beer.  He  was  sure  it 
could  not  be  wrong,  because  "back  in  Virginia  forty  years  ago 
even  the  preachers  would  keep  a  bottle  of  brandy  on  the  mantel." 
Besides  he  knew  he  was  right  because  he  "did  it  with  a  clear 
conscience."  Sure  enough  he  did.  But  what  a  poor,  blind 
conscience  it  was.  Many  a  man  has  a  clear  conscience  who, 
should  the  eyes  of  his  understanding  ever  be  opened,  will  be 
ashamed  that  he  had  not  had  a  guilty  conscience. 

The  guilty  conscience  belongs  to  the  man  who  suffers  the 
feeling  of  self  reproach.  The  experience  of  it  comes  only  to 
him  who  has  chosen  the  lower  of  two  goods  as  known  to  himself. 
It  is  unknown  to  the  man,  who,  to  use  the  common  phrase  "has 
done  the  best  he  knows  how."  No  matter  how  faulty  his 
conduct,  objectively  considered,  may  be,  he  cannot  have  any 
sense  of  guilt ;  this  is  the  conscience  whose  working  dramatists 
and  novelists  delight  to  portray,  e.g.,  "The  wicked  flee  when  no 
man  pursue th."  "Conscience  doth  make  cowards  of  us  all." 


86  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

"It's  mostly  when  I'm  naughty  that  I  see  things  in  the  night." 
The  guilty  soul  knows  its  own  ill  desert,  therefore  it  fears. 
Those  who  have  much  to  do  with  the  arrest  and  punishment  of 
evil  doers  know  that  you  may  as  surely  count  on  the  operation 
of  this  sentiment  as  on  the  instinct  or  appetite  of  an  animal  you 
are  hunting.  The  guilty  conscience  is  not  to  be  classed  among 
the  types  of  evil  conscience.  Of  course  the  things  that  occasion 
it  may,  and  probably  do,  indicate  some  perversity  of  the  moral 
nature ;  but  the  fact  that  the  doing  of  the  evil  deeds  is  followed 
by  the  painful  consciousness  of  guilt  is  an  indication  of  moral 
healthiness.  Hunger  is  painful,  but  it  is  the  healthy  man  who 
becomes  hungry  when  the  accustomed  supply  of  food  is  witheld. 
In  many  cases  of  dangerous  illness  the  aroused  appetite  is  the 
first  indication  of  returning  health.  It  is  just  so  in  the  moral 
life.  To  be  morally  unsound  is  indeed  a  serious  matter,  more 
serious  still  to  have  no  consciousness  of  that  unsoundness,  most 
serious  of  all  to  feel  no  pain  over  that  condition  when  known. 
We  may  classify  the  several  types  of  defective  conscience  as 
follows : 

f  Dark  Conscience 
( In  Intellect       j 

[  Perverted  Conscience 
Defective  Conscience  <| 

f  Weak  Conscience 
[  In  Sensibility    j 

[  Seared  Conscience 

The  dark  conscience  is  the  term  applied  to  the  man  who  is 
deficient  naturally  in  his  power  to  discern  moral  relations.  It 
is  said  of  him  that  he  lacks  moral  perception.  It  is  an  intel- 
lectual defect  and  may  exist  in  varied  degrees  of  intensity. 
Such  a  man  may  have  the  moral  feelings  well  developed.  He 
may,  within  the  limited  circle  within  which  he  does  distinguish 
things  as  right  or  wrong,  be  very  exacting  both  of  himself  and 
of  others,  but  beyond  a  certain  narrow  limit  he  fails  to  distin- 
guish right  from  wrong  at  all.  The  glaring  inconsistencies  of 
some  religious  zealots  (as  well  as  of  some  people  who  are  not. 
religious)  have  their  origin  in  this  defect.  Those  characterized 
by  this  defect  have  included  the  "fools  and  blind"  of  the  days 


THE  CONSCIENCE  87 

of  Jesus  as  well  as  those  of  a  more  ancient  time,  described  in  this 
selection : 

"Cry  aloud,  spare  not,  lift  up  thy  voice  like  a  trumpet,  and 
show  my  people  their  transgression,  and  the  house  of  Jacob 
their  sins. 

"Yet  they  seek  me  daily,  and  delight  to  know  my  ways,  as 
a  nation  that  did  righteousness,  and  forsook  not  the  ordinance 
of  their  God:  They  ask  of  me  the  ordinances  of  justice;  they 
take  delight  in  approaching  to  God.  Wherefore  have  we  fasted, 
say  they,  and  thou  seest  not?  wherefore  have  we  afflicted  our 
soul,  and  thou  takest  no  knowledge?  Behold  in  the  day  of 
your  fast  ye  find  pleasure  and  exact  all  your  labors. 

"Behold  ye  fast  for  strife  and  debate  and  to  smite  with  the 
fist  of  wickedness:  Ye  shall  not  fast  as  ye  do  this  day  to  make 
your  voice  to  be  heard  on  high.  Is  it  such  a  fast  that  I  have 
chosen?  a  day  for  a  man  to  afflict  his  soul?  Is  it  to  bow  down 
his  head  as  a  bulrush,  and  to  spread  sackcloth  and  ashes  under 
him?  wilt  thou  call  this  a  fast,  and  an  acceptable  day  unto  the 
Lord?"  Isaiah  58:1-5. 

This  lack  of  moral  discrimination  was  the  defect  of  those 
who  "tithed  mint  and  anise  and  cummin,  and  neglected  the 
weightier  matters  of  the  law";  of  those  who  "compassed  sea  and 
land  to  make  one  proselyte,  and  when  he  was  made,  made  him 
twofold  more  the  child  of  Hell  than  themselves."  It  is  found 
also  in  some  later  missionaries  who  wrought  pious  frauds  for  the 
glory  of  God  (?),  and  to  save  the  souls  of  the  heathen.  Some- 
thing of  it  too  may  be  suspected  in  those  of  us  today  who  find 
their  cruelty  and  coarseness  worthy  of  admiration.  It  was  the 
defect  of  our  "Pilgrim  fathers"  concerning  whom  some  one  has 
made  the  pun  that  when  they  landed  on  the  New  England 
shores  "  they  first  fell  on  their  knees,  and  then  on  the  aborigines  " 
—  those  pilgrims  who  tramped  in  the  snow  all  day  rather  than 
make  a  fire  on  the  Sabbath,  but  founded  a  civil  and  ecclesiastical 
order  which  allowed  the  burning  of  witches.  The  dark  con- 
science may  be  defective  with  reference  to  a  particular  class  of 
relations  or  it  may  be  dull  of  moral  perception  in  general.  It 
may  exist  in  connection  with  feeble  sensibilities,  or  the  moral 


88  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

feelings  may  be  very  alert  as  to  the  few  things  which  are  dis- 
cerned. It  may  appear  as  a  lack  of  capacity  to  discern  any 
moral  relation  in  something  at  all,  or  it  may  show  a  facility  for 
"seeing  things  crooked." 

Perhaps  in  our  discussion  of  the  Dark  Conscience  a  rather 
unwelcome  truth  has  been  forcing  itself  upon  our  attention. 
We  are  led  to  suspect  that  enlightenment  and  darkness  are 
relative  terms  —  that  the  perfectly  enlightened  conscience  is 
hypothetical  and  does  not  exist  among  men  — per  consequence 
each  one  will  be  compelled  to  admit  that  in  all  probability  some 
measure  of  darkness  pertains  to  his  conscience.  It  is  well, 
however,  to  remember  that  in  this  respect  there  is  no  infirmity 
of  the  moral  nature  which  does  not  equally  belong  to  every 
capacity  for  intellectual  activity.  There  are  great  differences 
in  our  capacities  to  see  and  to  hear,  and  where  will  we  find  the 
absolutely  perfect  and  adequate  eyes  and  ears?  Is  it  not 
probable  that  very  much  passes  unobserved  by,  and  unknown 
to  us,  which  would  be  discerned  were  our  vision  keener  and  our 
hearing  more  acute? 

Unpalatable  as  is  the  thought  that  probably  my  conscience 
is  somewhat  dark,  the  reflection  may  be  to  my  advantage.  It 
may  promote  a  charitable  consideration  of  those  who  assume  to 
have  a  clearer  moral  vision  than  I  have,  and  also  of  those  whom 
I  regard  as  inferior  to  me  in  moral  perception.  In  the  first 
case  it  has  usually  been  found  hard  to  forgive  the  man  who  says 
to  me, "  Let  me  pull  out  the  mote  out  of  thine  eye."  It  may  give 
us  patience  if  we  remember  that  probably  there  is  a  mote 
there.  If  on  the  other  hand  we  assume,  as  sometimes  we  must, 
to  correct  the  moral  vision  of  our  neighbor,  it  may  give  us 
discretion  and  modesty  to  remember  that  possibly  there  is  a 
beam  in  one  of  our  eyes. 

Another  type  of  moral  defect  is  that,  to  which  has  been  given 
the  name  the  Weak  Conscience.  This  condition  is  that  of  the 
man  whose  moral  feelings  are  exerted  with  feeble  energy.  No 
fact  in  the  whole  range  of  ethical  observation  is  clearer  than 
this:  that  the  moral  feelings  are  experienced  with  differing 
degrees  of  force.  This  phenomenon  may  result  either  from 


THE  CONSCIENCE  89 

inherent  differences  in  the  power  to  feel  at  all,  or  from  differences 
in  the  inhibitory  effect  of  other  emotions.  Whatever  the  cause, 
most  thinkers  will  admit  the  fact.  We  are  not  unmindful  of 
what  has  already  been  said  of  the  difficulty  of  measuring 
psychical  energy.  Once  more  let  it  be  remembered  that  to 
assume  to  measure  the  strength  of  a  feeling  by  its  sequence  in 
external  activity,  is  to  ignore  the  exercise  of  will  altogether. 
To  assume  that  A's  conscience  is  weaker  than  B's  because  he 
yields  to  a  temptation  which  B  resists  is  to  beg  the  question  of 
responsibility  completely.  But  though  we  lack  any  means  of 
measuring  the  intensity  of  the  moral  feelings  of  our  neighbor, 
each  one  of  us  is  able  to  observe  that  his  own  moral  feelings  are 
exerted  with  different  degrees  of  energy  at  different  times. 
From  this  indisputable  fact  of  personal  experience  it  is  not  an 
unreasonable  inference  that  the  maximum  capacity  of  different 
men  for  the  experience  of  the  sense  of  obligation,  of  self  approval 
or  self  reproach,  is  not  a  constant  although  we  have  no  units  in 
which  to  express  its  variations. 

But  the  absence  of  any  really  correct  and  definite  measure 
of  psychical  action  does  not  present  any  such  practical  difficulty 
as  some  have  supposed.  Long  before  men  heard  of  volts,  of 
ohms,  of  watts,  of  amperes,  they  did  recognize  differences  in 
sensation  as  marking  differences  in  energy  of  the  electric 
current.  In  our  experiences  of  physical  pain  no  one  questions 
one  experience  being  more  intense  than  another.  You  are 
passing  through  a  siege  of  "jumping  toothache";  I  ask,  "How 
is  your  tooth  this  morning?"  and  you  reply,  "It  still  aches  but 
not  as  badly  as  it  did  last  night."  How  foolish  I  would  be  to 
question  the  correctness  of  your  statement,  because  you  have 
no  units  in  which  to  express  the  variations  of  pain.  Certainly 
the  man  would  be  accounted  mad  who  would  insist  that  for 
that  reason  the  dentist  should  abandon  his  profession. 

While  you  cannot  meet  the  demand  of  the  man  who  insists 
on  a  quantitative  measure  of  the  sensibilities  there  are  tests 
possible,  of  their  variation  in  intensity  at  different  times,  with 
the  same  person.  We  may  "compare  spiritual  things  with 
spiritual."  I  ask  you  how  you  know  that  your  tooth  did  ache 


90  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

worse  last  night  than  this  morning.  You  would  no  doubt  think 
me  foolish  to  ask  any  other  evidence  than  your  own  simple 
statement  of  your  conscious  experience  of  the  difference;  but  if  I 
insist  on  an  answer,  you  will  appeal  to  the  psychological  principle 
of  the  inhibitory  power  of  the  sensibilities.  This  is  a  different 
thing  from  the  power  of  the  sensibility  to  compel  a  choice  (a 
thing  which  we  deny).  It  is  the  power  of  one  sensibility  to  dis- 
place another  feeling  or  idea  or  at  least  to  throw  it  into  the 
background  of  consciousness.  General  Grant  records  in  his 
memoirs  that  he  was  suffering  with  a  severe  headache  when  he 
received  the  message  from  Lee  that  he  was  ready  to  surrender. 
He  asserts  that  "  the  instant  I  saw  the  contents  of  that  note,  I 
was  cured."  In  proof  of  the  varying  intensity  of  your  tooth- 
ache at  the  two  times,  you  will  perhaps  remind  me  that  last 
night  it  destroyed  all  the  pleasure  of  the  evening  meal,  while 
this  morning  you  ate  your  breakfast  with  comfort.  Last 
evening  it  was  with  difficulty  that  you  read  a  chapter  from  a 
book  of  side  splitting  jokes,  while  this  morning  you  have  been 
able  readily  to  fasten  your  attention  on  the  solution  of  a  difficult 
problem  in  Mathematical  Astronomy.  It  does  not  seem  unrea- 
sonable to  say  that  with  the  same  person,  that  exercise  of  the 
sensibility  is  the  more  energetic  which  is  able  the  more  per- 
sistently to  thrust  itself  into  consciousness.  If  you  would 
understand  the  type  of  psychosis  which  we  have  called  the 
weak  conscience  you  must  conceive  of  some  one  whose  knowl- 
edge of  duty  in  some  respect  is  clear  and  distinct,  Hut  his 
feeling  of  obligation  is  feeble.  Some  degree  of  it  he  must  have; 
for  it  is  inconceivable  that  a  man  should  intellectually  approve 
one  good  as  higher  than  another,  without  experiencing  in  some 
measure  a  sense  of  obligation  to  choose  it:  yet  it  does  often 
occur  that  this  feeling  is  so  feeble,  so  unobtrusive,  that  it  is  easily 
thrust  aside.  In  like  manner  let  us  suppose  that  a  man  has 
chosen  the  lower  of  two  goods,  and  has  done  that  which  his 
judgment  condemned.  Some  feeling  of  self  reproach  is  sure  to 
follow,  but  in  the  supposed  case  it  is  not  a  greatly  disturbing 
element  in  the  man's  life.  He  still  eats  and  he  eats  with  a 
relish.  He  sleeps  and  he  sleeps  soundly.  His  waking  hours  are 


THE  CONSCIENCE  91 

filled  with  business  or  mirth,  and  no  avenging  spectres  haunt 
his  twilight  reveries.  The  opposite  of  this  is  the  man  the 
poet  has  in  mind  when  he  says  that  "Conscience  doth  make 
cowards  of  us  all."  He  is  scared  by  dreams,  terrified  by 
visions  and  "sees  things  in  the  night,"  and  forever  hears  that 
awful  voice  which  Pollock's  angel  heard  resounding  through  the 
caverns  of  perdition:  "Ye  knew  your  duty  and  ye  did  it  not." 
Let  the  man  with  the  Dark  Conscience  have  also  a  Weak  Con- 
science and  you  have  the  stuff  of  which  to  make  those  beings 
whose  "deeds  will  make  the  cheek  of  darkness  pale." 

We  can  no  more  account  for  all  the  variations  in  energy 
with  which  the  moral  feelings  are  exercised,  than  we  can  explain 
all  the  varieties  in  the  delicacy  of  our  senses  of  sight  and  hearing. 
At  this  stage  of  our  inquiries  we  only  note  the  fact  that  there 
are  such  variations,  and  assign  the  name  Weak  Conscience  to 
the  soul  which  is  but  feebly  moved  by  the  moral  feelings. 

The  Perverted  Conscience.  In  our  discussion  of  the  Dark 
Conscience  we  said  nothing  as  to  how  it  came  to  be  dark.  We 
used  that  term  to  designate  the  condition  of  inability  to  discern 
moral  relations.  The  term  carries  with  it  no  suggestion  of  the 
manner  in  which  that  condition  was  produced.  There  may  be 
several  reasons  for  such  darkness.  In  one  it  is  a  real,  a  con- 
stitutional infirmity  of  the  intellect — an  inability  to  think 
either  widely  or  deeply  —  a  spiritual  vision  that  "cannot  see 
afar  off."  In  this  condition  the  individual  does  not  deserve 
blame.  He  challenges  our  pity.  It  is  unfortunate  to  have  a 
dark  conscience  just  as  it  is  unfortunate  to  have  poor  eye  sight, 
however  the  condition  of  imperfect  vision  may  have  been  pro- 
duced. But  there  is  another  case.  It  is  that  of  the  man  who 
has  deliberately  put  darkness  for  light;  who  for  his  own  gratifi- 
cation has  chosen  to  call  some  evil  good  and  has  done  this  until 
he  really  believes  it  so.  This  is  the  Perverted  Conscience.  It 
is  more  common  than  may  be  supposed.  The  author's  atten- 
tion was  first  called  to  its  frequency  in  conversation  with  the 
executives  of  prisons  and  reformatories  who  stated  that  a 
considerable  percentage  of  the  inmates  of  those  institutions 
considered  themselves  the  most  abused  martyrs  above  ground, 


92  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

and  that  nothing  could  get  that  thought  out  of  their  minds. 
Account  for  it  as  you  may,  it  is  one  of  the  effects  of  a  course  of 
wrong  doing  long  persisted  in  that  the  man  comes  to  see  things 
crooked.  Talk  with  him  —  point  out  the  error  of  his  course, 
and  he  will  meet  you  with  the  slang  phrase,  "I  can't  see  it." 
A  lecturer  commenting  on  this  fact  cried  out:  "O  that  fearful 
'can't  see  it'!" 

It  may  at  first  excite  our  surprise  that  the  human  soul  should 
be  so  constituted  that  this  is  possible.  Like  many  other 
investigators  we  are  liable  to  be  led  into  speculation,  and  to 
find  ourselves  each  according  to  his  temperament  either  con- 
demning or  commending  the  plan  of  the  Creator.  But  we 
have  no  occasion  to  sit  in  judgment  on  the  plan  of  the  cosmic 
administration.  Such  an  effort  would  not  be  thought  of  in  the 
field  of  the  physiologist  or  of  the  physician.  It  is  not  his 
province  to  find  how  the  human  body  ought  to  have  been  made, 
and  what  the  conditions  of  health  ought  to  have  been.  He 
simply  inquires  how  it  is  made  and  what  the  conditions  are. 
The  moral  philosopher  is  not  primarily  concerned  with  proving 
that  the  order  of  nature  is  the  most  beneficent  conceivable. 
He  like  other  scientists  inquires  first  for  facts.  Let  a  holy  God 
or  a  malicious  fiend  be  supposed  to  be  in  control  of  the  govern- 
ment of  this  world.  It  matters  not  for  this  portion  of  our  dis- 
cussion. The  cold  fact  remains  a  fact.  Man's  moral  con- 
stitution is  such  that  he  may  in  time  voluntarily  reverse  many 
of  his  moral  judgments.  He  can  sometimes  willingly  believe  a 
lie  until  he  is  no  longer  capable  of  seeing  that  it  is  a  lie.  There 
is  possible  a  Perverted  Conscience. 

Joseph  Cook  when  lecturing  to  college  students  where  tutors 
were  available,  teaching  not  alone  the  truths  of  a  science,  but 
preparing  the  candidate  to  give  specific  answers  to  examination 
questions,  spoke  of  the  "tutored  conscience."  The  term  is  very 
expressive.  It  is  a  dangerous  experiment  to  "coach"  the 
moral  judgment  in  order  that  it  may  approve  the  solicitation  of 
passion  or  of  self  interest.  The  individual  who  does  this  in  one 
particular,  prepares  himself  to  do  so  in  another,  and  is  liable 
sooner  or  later  to  be  found  incapable  of  moral  discrimination. 


THE  CONSCIENCE  93 

A  good  example  of  the  Perverted  Conscience  may  be  found  in 
the  case  of  the  leaders  of  the  Mormon  church.  No  more 
sincere  company  of  religious  zealots  ever  did  the  bidding  of  a 
leader  than  that  which  followed  Joseph  Smith  to  Nauvoo.  Of 
course  we  believe  that  their  theology  was  a  poor  one,  but  there 
have  been  many  examples  of  an  upright  life  existing  along 
with  a  bad  theology.  But  for  the  promulgation  of  the  doctrine 
of  polygamy,  the  Mormon  church  might  have  had  as  honorable 
a  place  in  history  as  any  one  of  a  score  of  fanatical  sects  which 
have  risen  since  the  Reformation.  The  espousal  of  that 
doctrine  by  the  great  mass  of  the  church  is  an  example  of  the 
fearful  lengths  to  which  the  perverted  conscience  may  go  in  the 
reversal  of  the  moral  judgments  of  civilization. 

The  Seared  Conscience.  This  type  is  related  to  the  weak 
very  much  as  the  perverted  is  related  to  the  Dark  Conscience. 
The  man  with  the  weak  or  the  dark  conscience  may  be  entirely 
blameless.  His  condition  may  be  what  it  is  without  any  con- 
currence of  his  will.  The  man  with  either  the  perverted  or 
the  seared  conscience  is  never  without  guilt.  In  the  case  of 
the  seared,  the  defect  is  due  to  the  man's  own  self  determined 
activity. 

It  is  in  the  sluggishness  of  operation  of  the  feeling  of  self 
reproach  that  the  characteristics  of  the  seared  conscience  are 
most  readily  seen  although  the  other  moral  feelings  share  the 
infirmity. 

It  is  a  fact  of  our  psychical  constitution  that  an  emotion 
assented  to,  and  acted  upon,  increases  in  its  power  to  dominate 
the  life  even  though  it  cease  to  occupy  so  large  a  place  in  the 
mental  content.  An  emotion  repressed  or  simply  toyed  with, 
not  acted  upon,  decreases  in  its  impelling  energy. 

The  man  who  habitually  acts  in  response  to  his  sense  of 
obligation  will  find  that  this  sense  is  made  to  act  with  increasing 
energy,  while  his  choice  and  consequent  action  are  made  easier, 
since  the  passions  which  had  opposed  themselves  to  the  sense 
of  obligation  are  the  more  easily  resisted  a  second  time.  On 
the  other  hand,  if  appetite  or  greed  of  gain  has  been  exalted 
over  the  sense  of  obligation  to-day,  on  the  morrow  their  assault 


94  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

upon  the  man  will  be  reinforced  by  so  much  of  habit  while  the 
sense  of  obligation  will  assert  itself  with  feebler  energy. 

In  like  manner  the  choice  made  against  the  sense  of  obli- 
gation, we  may  suppose  in  the  first  instance,  was  followed  by 
intense  self  reproach.  This  feeling  impels  to  two  things:  (i) 
to  do  whatever  is  possible  in  retracing  the  evil  steps  already 
taken  —  to  do  whatever  may  be  done  for  the  undoing  of  the 
consequences  of  the  evil  act.  (2)  On  the  occasion  of  the 
recurrence  of  another  conflict  between  selfish  passion  and 
duty,  its  memory  is  present  re-enforcing  the  sense  of  obligation 
and  warning  me  of  the  uncomfortable  emotions  I  may  expect 
if  I  again  transgress  the  law  of  my  being  and  choose  the  lower 
good.  But  if  this  second  time  I  presume  to  set  aside  the  sense 
of  obligation  and  repeat  the  transgression  of  yesterday,  I  am 
likely  to  find  that  I  do  not  suffer  the  amount  of  discomfort 
that  I  had  anticipated.  I  may  know  as  well  as  ever  that  I  did 
wrong,  but  I  am  not  as  much  troubled  by  my  knowledge  of 
that  fact  as  I  was  on  the  previous  occasion.  If  now  this 
experience  is  repeated  until  I  can,  without  sense  of  shame  or 
consciousness  of  guilt,  do  that  evil  deed,  and  then  continue  to 
eat  and  sleep  undisturbed  by  regrets  I  have,  hi  its  completeness, 
the  Seared  Conscience,  the  most  lamentable  condition  into 
which  the  human  soul  can  plunge  itself;  a  condition  which  an 
ancient  writer  described  as  that  of  those  "who  being  past 
feeling  have  given  themselves  over  to  work  all  uncleanness  with 
greediness." 

We  have  treated  at  some  length  the  several  types  of  the 
defective  conscience.  It  is  in  place  now  to  observe  some 
species  of  excellence  in  the  moral  nature.  Imagine  a  man  who 
is  able  to  accurately  discern  moral  relations  —  most  certainly 
"to  approve  the  things  that  are  excellent "  —  to  weigh  cor- 
rectly the  differences  which  changing  circumstances  make  in 
the  fitness  of  an  action  in  order  that  it  may  conform  to  the  law 
of  good  will;  who,  moreover,  is  able  to  hold  his  egoistic  emotions 
in  abeyance  and  make  his  moral  judgments  uninfluenced  by 
prejudice  or  self  interest.  This  man  is  said  to  have  an  enlight- 
ened conscience.  The  things  we  have  named  also  describe  the 


THE  CONSCIENCE  95 

discriminating   conscience.     These    qualities    characterize    the 
action  of  the  conscience  as  intellect. 

In  the  realm  of  the  sensibility  there  is  what  is  known  as  the 
Tender  Conscience.  This  term  describes  the  condition  of  the 
man  whose  moral  feelings  are  acute  and  easily  aroused.  He 
feels  keenly  the  sense  of  obligation  to  do  that  which  his  judg- 
ment has  approved  as  right.  And  in  the  event  of  a  failure  so 
to  do,  he  is  filled  with  unspeakable  anguish.  A  poet  has  aptly 
described  this  condition  in  a  few  lines  of  song.  We  believe  it 
takes  nothing  from  its  merits  that  the  singer  in  several  places 
reveals  his  faith  in  Christian  theology: 

"  I  want  a  principle  within 
Of  jealous  godly  fear; 
A  sensibility  to  sin, 
A  pain  to  feel  it  near. 

The  Tender  Conscience  give. 

Quick  as  the  apple  of  an  eye, 
O  God  my  conscience  make; 
Awake  my  soul  when  sin  is  nigh 
And  keep  it  still  awake." 


CHAPTER  XVIII 
QUESTIONS  CONCERNING  CONSCIENCE 

I.  "WHICH  is  the  safer  guide  in  matters  of  duty,  the  feelings 
or  the  reason?"  Let  us  understand  what  feelings  are  in  the 
mind  of  the  questioner.  Men  sometimes  say,  "I  feel  that  I 
must  do  this  or  that,"  when  were  they  to  speak  correctly,  they 
would  say:  "I  very  much  desire  to  do  this  or  that."  It  is  in 
a  very  indefinite  way  that  a  man's  appetites,  emotions,  or  pas- 
sions are  any  indication  at  all  as  to  that  which  he  ought  to  do. 
To  illustrate:  I  am  hungry.  Perhaps  that  hunger  does  indicate 
that  it  was  designed  that  I  should  live  by  eating.  It  may 
further  indicate  that  I  now  need  food.  Admit  all  that,  but 
the  question  what  I  shall  do  in  regard  to  the  tempting  viand 
now  before  me  is  not  answered  at  all.  For  aught  my  appetite 
will  reveal,  there  may  be  disease  in  this  particular  morsel. 
Neither  will  my  appetite  inform  me  of  the  needs  of  others  whose 
claim  to  this  particular  loaf  may  be  better  than  mine.  A  very 
common  error  in  practical  ethics  is  to  put  a  feeling  of  inclina- 
tion for  the  dictate  of  conscience.  More  than  once  when  people 
have  asked  the  author's  advice  and  have  been  told  "Do  what 
you  think  to  be  right,"  they  have  quoted  him  as  saying:  "Do 
what  you  feel  like  doing."  No  two  counsels  could  be  farther 
apart  than  these. 

Not  only  is  there  no  necessary  coincidence  of  the  reason 
with  natural  inclination,  they  are  often  found  diametrically 
opposed  to  each  other.  Seeing  this,  one  moralist  even  suggested 
that  the  natural  impulses  were  given  us  for  the  purpose  of  being 
resisted.  Without  taking  this  extreme  view,  which  has  in  it 
the  principle  of  asceticism,  we  would  say  that  these  are  not  the 
feelings  which  claim  our  attention,  in  an  effort  to  answer  the 
question  before  us.  It  is  the  moral  feelings  as  a  guide  to  duty 
which  are  here  to  be  considered.  We  have  the  case  of  a  man 


QUESTIONS  CONCERNING  CONSCIENCE        97 

who  says:  "My  judgment  is  that  this  is  what  I  ought  to  do, 
while  I  feel  that  I  ought  to  do  otherwise. "  "I  believe  that  this 
is  right,  but  am  troubled  with  a  guilty  conscience  when  I  do  it. " 
In  short,  conscience  is  supposed  to  give  contrary  counsels; 
as  intellect  discerning  and  affirming  one  good  to  be  the  higher; 
as  sensibility  pressing  me  with  the  sense  of  obligation  and  the 
fear  of  self  reproach  to  do  the  other.  We  do  not  believe  that 
any  case  of  real  conflict  such  as  that  supposed  can  occur;  but 
should  one  appear  to  arise  in  the  experience  of  any  one,  he  should 
understand  that  in  a  question  of  duty  the  sensibility  is  no  guide 
at  all.  We  have  shown  that  the  moral  feelings  always  follow 
the  moral  judgment,  and  we  are  confident  that  to  this  rule  there 
are  no  exceptions.  The  cases  where  a  feeling  of  self  reproach 
has  followed  an  act  supposed  to  have  been  in  conformity  with 
the  judgment,  or  a  feeling  of  approval  an  act  not  in  conformity 
with  it,  need  to  be  more  carefully  considered.  An  example 
will  perhaps  explain  the  paradox,  or  at  least  hint  at  the  solution. 
A  pioneer  Methodist  preacher  once  gave  in  the  hearing 
of  the  author  his  experience  in  burning  corn  for  fuel.  He  said: 
"From  my  earliest  recollection  I  was  trained  to  preserve  from 
waste  every  morsel  which  any  thing  could  eat.  When  corn 
was  shelled  for  meal,  it  was  the  rule  that  every  grain  scattered 
on  the  floor  must  be  carefully  picked  up  and  thrown  to  the 
chickens;  to  sweep  it  into  the  fire  with  the  litter  was  a  sin. 
My  mother  would  quote  the  proverb:  "A  willful  waste,  a  woe- 
ful want."  This  training  received  a  rude  shock  when  as  a 
young  man  I  was  sent  to  preach  in  a  town  on  the  frontier  in 
a  treeless  region.  The  trade  in  coal  had  not  yet  been  established 
there.  Many  settlers  burned  corn.  Wood  was  hauled  from 
ten  to  fifteen  miles,  and  sold  at  from  ten  to  twelve  dollars  a  cord 
and  at  times  could  not  be  procured  at  all.  I  bought  two  cords 
at  that  price — I  vowed  I  would  not  burn  corn.  About  the  time 
that  wood  was  gone,  I  found  my  pocketbook  empty  also.  A 
brother  proposed  to  bring  me  a  load  of  corn.  He  burned  corn. 
He  argued  the  case  with  me.  I  yielded.  I  shall  never  forget 
my  experience  with  the  first  fire  made  of  that  corn.  It  made  a 
good  fire;  we  were  the  most  comfortable  we  had  been  for  weeks, 


98  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

but  I  was  unhappy.  There  sounded  in  my  ears  my  mother's 
warning:  "A  willful  waste,  a  woeful  want. "  So  sharp  were  the 
pangs  of  conscience  that,  after  burning  corn  for  two  days, 
I  took  my  team,  went  to  the  timber,  and  by  cutting  and  hauling 
the  wood  myself  brought  the  cost  within  the  possibilities  of 
my  pocketbook.  It  made  a  heavy  draft  on  my  time.  Some  of 
my  work  was  left  undone  and  my  wife  resorted  to  painful 
expedients  to  save  fuel,  but  we  had  that  inestimable  blessing, 
a  clear  conscience.  During  the  following  summer,  as  I  rode 
over  the  prairies,  I  made  the  matter  an  object  of  careful  study. 
I  compared  that  country,  with  its  possibilities  of  corn  culture 
but  scarcity  of  timber,  with  southern  Ohio,  in  its  early  settle- 
ment with  its  abundance  of  timber,  but  small  and  hardly  tilled 
cornfields.  The  question  now  came  tome:  Why  had  my  mother 
not  thought  it  a  waste  to  burn  all  that  good  timber  in  the  log 
heap?  It  occurred  to  me,  too,  that  God  who  had  created  the 
timber  in  Ohio  had  left  northwestern  Iowa  treeless.  If  men 
were  to  live  in  Ohio  they  must  raise  corn ;  and  to  raise  corn  they 
must  clear  the  forest  and  waste  the  timber.  If  men  were  at 
this  time  to  live  in  Iowa  and  raise  corn  they  must  have  some- 
thing for  fuel.  Let  us  see:  the  Ohio  pioneer  could  with  great 
effort  raise  ten  acres  of  corn  among  the  stumps  and  roots. 
The  Iowa  farmer  easily  raised  forty  acres  of  corn;  he  can  take 
five  acres  of  that  (an  abundance)  for  fuel,  and  then  have  three 
and  a  half  times  as  much  as  the  Ohio  farmer  toward  feeding  the 
hungry  millions.  It  seemed  that  if  the  Lord  were  wanting  to 
feed  the  world  bountifully,  he  had  done  a  good  thing  in  sending 
the  Ohio  pioneer  to  Iowa,  to  raise  his  forty  acres  of  corn  instead 
of  ten,  although  he  did  take  five  acres  for  fuel.  The  matter 
was  settled  in  my  mind  from  that  hour.  When  the  next  winter 
came  we  "had  corn  to  burn, "  and  I  never  had  a  twinge  of  con- 
science over  it  again. " 

We  have  given  in  his  own  word  the  man's  story  in  full, 
because  it  furnishes  a  better  solution  of  the  difikulty  than  any 
abstract  statement  could  do.  He  had  the  feeling  of  reproach, 
when  burning  the  corn  at  first,  because  he  had  never  really,  in 
his  own  mind,  reversed  his  former  judgment  that  corn  burning 


QUESTIONS   CONCERNING  CONSCIENCE        99 

was  wrong.  At  the  solicitation  of  self  interest  as  a  matter  of 
economy,  he  allows  himself  to  be  persuaded  by  his  neighbor 
to  change  his  practice,  but  he  had  not  changed  his  moral  judg- 
ment. That  change  was  reached  only  during  those  summer 
meditations.  After  that  he  burns  corn  with  a  clear  conscience. 

II.  Is  conscience  a  safe  moral  guide?  No  one  with  an  under- 
standing of  conscience  as  it  has  been  explained  in  this  work 
could  ask  that  question.  It  is  just  as  absurd  as  to  ask  whether 
a  man's  eyesight  is  a  safe  guide,  in  walking  along  the  road,  or 
whether  the  reason  could  safely  be  trusted  in  the  solution  of  a 
problem  in  geometry.  These  cases  have  many  points  of  simi- 
larity. "The  light  of  the  body  is  the  eye. "  There  are  but  few 
perfectly  sound  eyes.  If  you  are  entirely  blind,  you  will  com- 
mit yourself  to  the  guidance  of  another,  which  after  all  is  but 
trusting  his  eyesight  rather  than  your  own.  But  if  you  at- 
tempt to  go  abroad  alone,  there  is  absolutely  nothing  for  you 
to  trust  but  your  eyesight.  Be  it  good  or  bad,  safe  or  other- 
wise, it  is  all  you  have. 

Is  the  reason  a  safe  guide  in  the  solution  of  a  problem  in 
geometry?  "Oh,  I  have  no  talent  for  mathematics."  That 
generally  means,  "I  have  no  taste  for  mathematics.  I  do 
not  like  the  close  application,  the  intense  effort  and  strained 
attention  necessary  to  mathematical  demonstration."  But  if 
you  must  have  it  so,  let  it  be  conceded  that  you  were  poorly 
endowed  by  the  Creator  in  that  respect.  You  were  "born 
short"  on  mathematics.  Its  concepts  are  hard  for  you  to 
comprehend  and  use.  What  will  you  do  about  it?  Some  stu- 
dents commit  the  demonstration  in  the  text,  but  that  is  a 
study  of  words,  not  of  geometry.  If  you  really  go  one  step 
forward,  you  must  use  your  own  reason.  It  may  be  a  poor 
guide,  slow,  dull,  sluggish,  but  it  is  all  you  have.  It  is  true  of 
mathematics,  as  some  one  said,  "He  who  enters  its  mystic  gate, 
and  explores  its  vales  and  hills,  must  go  alone. " 

No  heat  of  emotion  will  soften  the  shell  of  a  mathematical 
hard  nut.  Your  reason,  good  or  bad,  you  must  use.  What  it 
does  not  do  is  left  undone.  We  would  say  the  same  things  of 
the  human  conscience.  Let  it  be  remembered  that  it  is  the 


ioo  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

conscience  as  intellect  of  which  we  now  speak.  Some  writers 
speak  in  terms  of  commendation  of  those  trusting  souls  who 
yield  unquestioning  obedience  to  priest,  or  church,  or  book. 
Be  it  so.  Truly  "blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit";  but  we  can 
approve  such  confiding  obedience  in  mature  life,  when,  and  only 
when,  the  reason  has  first,  on  evidence,  judged  that  the  priest 
or  the  book  is  trustworthy.  To  do  that  is  the  province  of  the 
human  reason.  Trustfulness  and  hope  are  indeed  good  things, 
but  it  should  be  remembered  that  those  moral  teachers  who 
have  most  magnified  these  virtues  have  exhorted  us  to  be 
"ready  to  give"  a  "reason  for  the  hope  that  is  in  us."  No, 
conscience  is  not  an  absolutely  safe  moral  guide,  but  it  is  all 
you  have.  Following  your  conscience  you  will  make  some 
mistakes;  still  following  it  you  will  have  fine  opportunities  to 
correct  them.  Set  conscience  aside  and  you  will  make  many 
more  mistakes,  and  have  nothing  with  which  to  correct  them. 
III.  Does  a  man  always  do  right  in  obeying  his  conscience? 
The  answer  to  this  will  depend  on  the  meaning  of  the  questioner. 
Does  he  inquire  objectively  or  subjectively?  Does  he  mean 
formal  or  material  Tightness?  If  he  means  formal  Tightness, 
we  answer  yes;  for  formal  Tightness  consists  in  nothing  else 
than  conforming  the  choice  to  the  moral  judgment.  If  he 
mean  material  Tightness,  we  answer,  not  necessarily;  indeed  he 
may  be  doing  just  the  wrong  thing.  If  you  ask  which  is  the 
more  important,  subjective,  that  is  formal,  or  objective,  that 
is  material  Tightness,  we  would  say  that  subjective  Tightness  is 
most  important  to  the  man  himself  and  objective  Tightness 
most  important  to  his  neighbor.  A  public  speaker  in  Iowa  in 
a  political  campaign  a  few  years  since  said,  "I  would  rather  do 
wrong  thinking  that  I  was  right,  than  to  do  right  thinking 
that  I  was  wrong."  More  profound  moral  philosophy  was 
never  uttered.  Once  more  formal  or  subjective  Tightness 
depends  on  the  conformity  of  the  will  to  the  moral  judgment; 
material  or  objective  Tightness  depends  on  the  absolute  cor- 
rectness of  that  judgment.  We  may  give  an  illustration  of 
the  principle  involved:  Your  physician  stands  at  your  bedside 
while  the  balance  swings  between  life  and  death.  Several 


QUESTIONS  CONCERNING  CONSCIENCE      101 

courses  of  treatment  are  open  to  him.  Absolute  certainty  as 
to  results  may  be  an  impossibility,  but  there  is  one  course, 
that  after  deliberation  and  counsel  commends  itself  to  him, 
as  on  the  whole,  holding  out  the  greater  probability  of  life  and 
health.  Now  to  that  physician,  subjective  Tightness  consists 
in  his  choice  to  do  that  thing,  objective  Tightness  depends  on 
the  correctness  of  that  thing.  Every  one  will  agree  that  sub- 
jective Tightness  is  most  important  to  the  physician,  objective 
Tightness  most  important  to  you.  Does  the  physician  do  right 
in  obeying  his  conscience?  Yes,  even  though  in  so  doing  he 
ignorantly  gives  you  the  medicine  that  kills  you.  A  man  may 
be  subjectively  right  and  objectively  wrong,  but  he  can  not  be 
subjectively  right,  unless  he  thinks  he  is  objectively  right  also. 

A  careful  distinction  should  be  made  between  things  which 
conscience  requires  and  those  which  it  simply  does  not  forbid. 
A  man  has  carefully,  seriously,  dispassionately,  as  he  can, 
weighed  everything  known  to  him,  in  the  relation  of  his  neigh- 
bor to  himself.  A  certain  course  of  conduct  appears  to  him 
the  one  most  befitting  his  manhood.  In  regard  to  this  there  is 
a  categorical  imperative  "you  must."  There  is  nothing  else 
to  do.  He  is  condemned  if  he  do  not  obey. 

But  the  voice  of  conscience  is  not  thus  emphatic  about 
everything.  Not  all  things  permissible  are  obligatory.  Some 
conduct  will  appear  to  me  indifferent;  e.  g.  shall  I  take  beef 
steak  or  pork  steak,  as  I  sit  at  the  restaurant  table  with  my 
Jewish  neighbor?  He  can  not  choose  pork  without  condem- 
nation, but  I  can  not  plead  equal  conscientiousness  in  demand- 
ing it.  In  his  youth  the  author  knew  two  Protestant  families, 
each  employing  a  Roman  Catholic  hired  man.  These  men 
would  not  eat  meat  on  Friday.  In  one  home,  on  Friday,  the 
meat  was  made  to  take  a  subordinate  place,  while  a  bountiful 
supply  of  eggs  was  cooked.  The  household  could  eat  eggs  on 
Friday  as  well  as  on  any  other  day.  In  the  other  home  that 
day  was  selected  for  an  ostentatious  display  of  roasts  and  broils. 
And  both  the  man  and  his  wife  contended  that  they  did  it  for 
conscience  sake.  Common  sense  will  indicate  which  home 
showed  the  higher  humanity. 


CHAPTER  XIX 
AUTHORITY  IN  MORALS 

IN  the  light  of  our  previous  discussion,  some  may  ask:  Can 
there  be  any  authority  in  morals?  And  frankly  we  answer,  No. 
There  is  no  authority  in  morals  any  more  than  in  mathematics. 
We  stand  in  both  religion  and  morals  for  the  Protestant  right 
of  private  judgment.  We  accept  the  doctrine  of  this  right,  in 
good  faith,  with  all  its  implications,  its  consequences,  and  its 
inconveniences.  No  human  being  of  sufficient  intelligence  to 
form  a  moral  judgment  has  a  right  to  surrender  his  right  to 
form  that  judgment,  to  the  dictates  of  another.  I  absolutely 
deny  the  right  of  any  priest,  church,  or  of  any  other  master 
under  the  sun,  to  do  my  thinking  for  me.  To  submit  to  such 
domination  is  moral  suicide.  And  yet  in  the  affairs  of  human 
life,  there  come  times  when  there  are  conflicting  judgments 
as  to  the  right  in  practical  affairs.  Some  action  is  imperative. 
A  "modus  vivendi"  must  be  found.  One  man  or  the  other, 
must,  for  a  time  surrender  his  external  conduct  to  the  judgment 
of  another.  It  is  the  purpose  of  this  chapter  to  set  forth  when 
and  to  what  extent  this  is  permissible.  The  question  is  really 
one  of  Practical  Ethics,  but  on  account  of  its  close  relation  to 
the  principles  we  have  been  discussing,  we  will  consider  it  here. 
Remember  that  in  any  case  it  is  the  conduct,  not  the  moral 
judgment  that  is  yielded.  The  most  that  can  be  said  of  the 
moral  judgment  is  that  it  is  held  in  abeyance.  The  right  to 
form  one's  own  moral  judgment  must  never  be  surrendered;  but 
we  repeat  there  are  times  when  even  in  matters  involving  moral 
relations  one  may  submit  his  conduct  to  the  judgment  of 
another. 

i.  In  childhood:  It  would  be  very  unfortunate  if  children 
were  obliged  to  learn  all  moral  truth  as  original  investigators. 
The  child  early  comes  to  know  something  of  his  limitations; 

102 


AUTHORITY  IN  MORALS  103 

that  parents  are  wiser  than  he  and  that  it  is  best  to  trust  them 
in  matters  of  opinion  and  action.  We  would  have  him  accept 
moral  maxims  in  the  same  manner — and  in  no  other  manner, 
than  that  in  which  he  receives  their  statements  of  politics,  of 
history,  of  science,  and  of  the  mechanical  arts.  In  all  these 
things  he  is  in  tutelage.  He  receives  his  first  ideas  in  them 
ready  formed,  and  on  his  parents'  authority,  and  up  to  the  time 
of  matured  reason,  must  yield  to  them  in  matters  of  conduct. 
Meanwhile  he  is  forming  his  own  opinions.  It  should  be  so  in 
morals,  and  there  is  no  reason  why  the  transition  from  simple, 
unquestioning  obedience  to  independent  and  rational  judgment 
and  action  should  not  be  as  easy,  gradual  and  natural  in  the 
one  case  as  in  the  other.  It  is  a  mistake  to  teach  children  that 
morals  and  religion  are  in  a  field  so  exclusive  and  individual 
that  they  are  at  liberty  to  treat  the  parents'  wishes  with  con- 
tempt. 

2.  Any  man  may  act  upon  the  conclusions  of  those  who 
have  merited  his  confidence,  pending  the  formation  of  his  own 
moral  judgment  in  the  matter  in  question.     But  observe  that 
in  any  matter  involving  my  own  well  being,  or  in  one  where  my 
conduct  may  involve  the  rights  of  another,  I  can  justify  myself 
in  suspending  judgment  only  until  I  have  in  my  possession  the 
facts  on  which  to  base  a  judgment.    In  no  case  when  those 
facts  may  be  obtained  is  it  permissible  to  rest  on  the  judgment 
of  another.     I  am  obligated  as  a  reasonable  man  to  form  an 
opinion,  and  having  formed  it  to  surrender  it  only  on  the  presen- 
tation of  new  and  convincing  proof.     "With  charity  for  all, 
and  malice  toward  none,"  and  courtesy  to  those  who  differ  from 
me,  I  must  maintain  that  opinion  against  the  world.    Majori- 
ties do  not  count  in  morals. 

3.  Pending  the  formation  of  my  own  moral  judgment,  and 
while  I  must  commit  my  conduct  to  the  direction  of  another, 
it  may  occur  that  a  choice  must  be  made  between  opposing 
authorities.    This  rule  is  suggested  to  be  observed  in  the  selec- 
tion of  the  authority  to  which  I  submmit.    The  presumprion  is 
in  favor  of  the  more  discriminating  conscience.    This  is  in 
accord  with  other  psychical  facts.    One  man  affirms  that  he 


104  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

sees  more  stars  in  the  sky  than  another;  the  presumption  is 
that  the  stars  are  there.  One  man  affirms  that  he  sees  more 
colors  than  another;  the  presumption  is  that  he  is  correct. 
One  man  affirms  that  there  is  a  discord  in  a  piece  of  music. 
Although  ten  others  heard  nothing  amiss,  the  presumption  is 
that  the  discord  is  there.  It  may  be  thought  that  we  will 
find  few  occasions  to  use  this  principle.  There  are  but  few 
compared  with  the  great  number  of  occasions  when  one  may 
form  his  own  moral  judgments  with  reasonable  certainty;  but 
there  are  a  sufficient  number  of  such  cases  to  justify  us  in 
calling  attention  to  the  principle.  There  is  hardly  one  of  earth's 
great  wrongs  concerning  which  men  have  not  been  compelled 
to  choose  their  course  of  conduct  between  opposing  authorities. 
In  another  place  we  have  spoken  of  Lincoln's  visit  to  New 
Orleans  where  he  witnessed  the  sale  of  the  girl  from  the  auction 
block,  and  said:  "Boys,  if  I  ever  get  a  chance  to  hit  that  thing, 
I'll  hit  it  hard."  There  were  other  flat-boatmen  with  him 
from  his  own  neighborhood  and  social  circle.  They  were  just 
as  able  to  form  a  correct  judgment  as  he.  As  to  what  they 
said  when  they  came  home,  history  is  silent.  It  is  usually 
silent  regarding  men  without  positive  convictions;  but  you  can 
easily  imagine  the  whole  crew  coming  home,  sitting  around  the 
corner  grocery,  airing  their  opinions  to  the  gaping  loafers. 
Is  there  anything  which  ought  to  determine  the  attitude  of  one 
of  those  listeners  toward  those  diverse  opinions?  Only  this: 
the  presumption  is  in  favor  of  Lincoln's  more  discriminating 
conscience.  And  if  pending  the  formation  of  his  own  opinion, 
he  is  compelled  to  cast  a  vote  for  or  against  the  extension  of 
slavery,  that  consideration  would  justify  him  in  casting  his  vote 
on  Lincoln's  side  of  the  question.  No  one  can  give  any  reason 
for  choosing  to  follow  the  less  discriminating  conscience,  and  the 
practical  outcome  of  rejecting  our  principle  in  such  cases  is  to 
surrender  one's  self  to  the  sway  of  selfish  interest  and  passion. 
4.  How  may  one  be  assured  that  his  moral  discernment  as 
a  faculty  is  good,  and  that  in  some  particular  case  it  is  correct? 
We  can  not  go  far  in  this  discussion  until  we  strike  a  difficulty. 
Absolute  certainty — beyond  the  possibility  of  some  shade  of 


AUTHORITY  IN  MORALS  105 

error  is  seldom  attainable.  Almost  every  thoughtful  and  con- 
scientious man  has  found  himself  under  the  necessity  of  revising 
the  moral  judgments  of  his  early  years.  He  can  seldom  know 
that  the  judgment  which  he  forms  to-day  will  stand  the  test  of 
time  and  of  his  further  matured  experience.  He  can  seldom  be 
sure  that  he  has  all  the  facts  which  might  modify  his  judgment. 
But  if  he  make  this  discovery  the  ground  for  assuming  an  indiff- 
erent attitude  toward  ethical  questions,  he  falls  into  grievous 
error.  The  infirmity  we  have  noted  is  not  confined  to  our  ethical 
knowledge.  With  all  the  appliances  invented  to  aid  our  senses, 
it  seems  probable  that  the  greater  portion  of  the  things  which 
transpire  in  the  universe  are  absolutely  unperceived  by  us. 
Let  us  ask  another  question.  How  may  a  man  know  that  he 
has  good  faculties  of  hearing  and  of  seeing?  and  that  in  any 
given  case  through  these  senses  he  has  apprehended  "the 
truth,  the  whole  truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth"?  We  are 
forced  to  admit  that  the  possibility  of  error  always  exists,  and 
that  much  of  what  goes  on  about  him  does  not  reach  the  soul 
at  all,  because  of  the  dullness  of  these  senses.  And  yet  the  man 
would  be  counted  mad  who  would  refuse  to  use  and  trust  those 
senses.  The  soul  exercising  the  power  to  hear  is  the  only 
authority  as  to  its  power  to  hear.  Let  an  oculist  test  your  eyes, 
and  you  will  agree  with  me  that  the  soul  exercising  the  power  to 
see  is  the  only  authority  as  to  the  acuteness  of  vision.  The 
soul  itself,  exercising  the  power  of  moral  discrimination,  is  the 
only  authority  as  to  its  power  of  moral  discernment.  The 
proof  to  you  that  you  have  good  eyesight,  is  that  you  do  see 
afar  off,  and  that  you  do  distinguish  minutely  the  things  that 
are  near.  The  proof  that  your  moral  discernment  as  a  faculty 
is  good  will  be  the  fact  that  you  find  yourself  really  making 
discriminations  —  that  you  form  moral  judgments  frequently; 
that  the  great  mass  of  human  conduct  is  adjudged  by  you  as 
right  or  wrong;  that  you  discern  moral  relations  in  your  own 
conduct  continuously.  Especially  may  you  consider  your 
moral  discernment  good  if  you  find  it  opposing  the  obstacle 
of  a  moral  judgment  to  your  imperious  appetites  and  your 
selfish  passions. 


106  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Let  no  one  make  the  mistake  of  supposing  that  his  power  of 
moral  discrimination  is  irrevocably  fixed  in  the  status  in  which 
he  finds  it  at  a  given  time.  No  doubt  there  are  limitations 
and  we  have  no  right  to  expect  all  men  to  reach  the  same  level 
of  proficiency;  but  there  is  nothing  clearer  than  that  acuteness 
of  a  man's  moral  discrimination  varies  from  one  period  of  his 
life  to  another.  We  have  likened  the  conscience  to  our  senses 
of  sight  and  hearing,  but  the  analogy  breaks  down  at  an  impor- 
tant point;  you  may  injure  your  eyesight,  but  you  can  do  little 
to  improve  it.  Your  moral  discernment  is  capable  of  improve- 
ment— of  development.  The  sweet  singer  of  Israel  exclaims: 
"My  ears  hast  thou  digged";  and  again:  "Open  thou  my  eyes 
that  I  may  behold  wondrous  things  out  of  thy  law, "  and  Paul 
prays  for  the  Ephesian  Christians  that  "  the  eyes  of  your  under- 
standing" might  be  "enlightened." 

As  to  the  correctness  of  any  particular  judgment,  again 
the  soul's  power  to  discern  is  ultimate.  To  me  things  can  not 
be  otherwise  than  they  seem.  The  only  use  that  the  judgment 
of  other  men  can  have  for  me  is  to  suggest  that  I  go  over  the 
ground  and  look  again;  perhaps  that  I  again  examine  the  facts 
on  which  my  judgment  was  based. 

There  are  some  circumstances,  however,  which  may  well 
make  me  suspicious  of  my  moral  judgments  and  lead  me  to 
hold  them  subject  to  revision: 

(a)  When  they  have  been  made  with  only  a  partial  consider- 
ation of  the  facts,  or  with  a  limited  knowledge  of  them. 

(b)  When  the  conclusion  reached  is  one  that  has  been  fore- 
casted and  longed  for. 

(c)  When  the  judgment  has  been  made  under  the  pressure 
of  a  very  energetic  egoistic  sensibility. 

Presuming  the  essential  facts  on  which  to  base  a  judgment 
to  be  at  your  command,  there  is  one  condition  of  soul  which  is 
very  favorable  to  the  correctness  of  the  moral  judgment.  This 
is  an  attitude  of  absolute  indifference  as  to  how  the  truth  may 
affect  you,  if  only  it  is  the  truth. 

5.  Another  question  at  times  of  considerable  importance 
relates  to  the  respect  which  men  of  diverse  moral  views  on  some 


AUTHORITY  IN  MORALS  107 

subject  are  bound  to  show  to  each  other's  opinions.  We  have 
already  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  there  is  a  difference 
between  the  conviction  that  a  doing  or  forbearing  is  a  duty, 
and  the  simple  persuasion  that  it  is  permissible  to  do  or  to  for- 
bear as  the  case  may  be.  In  the  former  case  the  man  must 
act;  he  has  an  object  for  which  he  must  contend,  on  pain  of 
condemnation.  In  the  latter  case,  to  forego  his  privilege  of 
action  or  forbearance  may  be  a  deed  of  charitable  courtesy. 
No  ethical  theory  has  ever  involved  the  idea  that  a  man  is  in 
conscience  bound  to  insist  on  the  full  extent  of  his  privileges. 

Now  it  sometimes  occurs  that  men  of  equally  good  intellect, 
with  equal  access  to  facts,  and  equally  desirous  to  judge  rightly, 
find  themselves  facing  each  other  with  radically  different  moral 
judgments.  It  is  sometimes  possible  that  such  persons  as 
Abraham  and  Lot  or  Paul  and  Mark  may  part,  and  sundering 
some  of  their  relations  to  each  other,  cease  to  annoy  one  an- 
other. In  other  cases,  separation  may  be  either  impossible  or 
on  some  account  unwise;  a  "modus  vivendi"  must  be  agreed 
to.  Some  one  must  yield  a  point.  Who  shall  step  aside?  The 
rule  for  cases  of  this  kind  is  that  deference  is  due  to  the  man 
with  positive  convictions  of  duty.  Respect  should  be  shown 
to  the  man  who  feels  the  pressure  of  an  obligation  to  act.  Do 
not  confuse  this  with  the  rare  case  where  each  with  equal  pres- 
sure feels  the  "categorical  imperative";  then  it  is: 

"Lay  on  MacDuff,  and  damned  be  he 

Who  first  cries  'hold!'  'enough!'" 

But  seldom  in  the  moral  struggles  of  society,  is  the  issue  thus 
sharply  joined. 

Once  again  we  turn  to  that  cyclopedia  of  ethical  illustra- 
tion: the  American  civil  war  with  its  antecedents;  it  has  be- 
come fashionable  in  some  quarters  to  laud  the  heroes  of  the 
"Lost  Cause,"  and  treat  the  matter  as  though  the  men  on  both 
sides  were  equally  deserving  of  credit  for  devotion  to  what  they 
conceived  to  be  the  truth.  However  correct  this  may  be  as 
to  the  rank  and  file  of  the  contending  armies,  it  is  not  true  of 
the  men  who  precipitated  the  struggle.  In  the  antislavery 
controversy,  few  if  any  advocated  slave  holding  and  slavery 


zo8  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

extension  as  a  duty.  The  most  any  one  could  do  would  be  to 
claim  it  as  a  privilege  which  he  must  be  allowed  to  enjoy  where- 
ever  he  pleased  without  rebuke.  And  when  Secession  was  brew- 
ing, very  few  advocated  it  as  a  duty.  It  was  a  privilege  to  be 
exercised  by  the  states  at  their  own  sweet  will.  The  applica- 
tion of  the  principle  we  are  considering — that  of  deference  due 
to  the  men  with  positive  convictions  —  would  have  saved  those 
four  years  of  wasting  and  carnage.  Let  no  one  think,  either, 
that  the  distinction  we  have  made  between  things  required 
and  those  simply  permitted  was  unheard  of  then.  In  his  first 
inaugural,  President  Lincoln  addressing  his  "dissatisfied  fellow 
countrymen"  says:  "You  have  no  oath  registered  in  heaven  to 
destroy  this  government  while  I  shall  have  a  most  solemn  one 
to  preserve,  protect,  and  defend  it."  What  was  this  but  an 
appeal  to  the  principle  we  are  considering?  They  could  for- 
bear with  no  violence  to  conscience;  he  dared  not  retreat. 
It  is  usually  so  with  those  who  push  and  those  who  oppose 
moral  reforms. 


BOOK  II— PRACTICAL  ETHICS 

CHAPTER  I 
INTRODUCTION 

WE  come  now  to  the  study  of  the  content  of  human  duty 
Although  the  term  Ethics,  from  the  Greek  "ethos,"  custom 
has  sometimes  been  used  to  cover  the  whole  subject  of  Moral 
Science,  for  our  purpose  it  seems  more  appropriate  to  limit 
it  to  one  division  of  the  subject — the  enumeration  and  classifica- 
tion of  duties  with  a  discussion  of  each. 

Ethics  must  always  be  studied  in  the  light  of  Moral  Philos- 
ophy, just  as  the  special  problems  of  any  branch  of  mathe- 
matics are  subordinate  to  the  axioms  and  fundamental  thought 
conceptions  which  underlie  the  whole  science  of  quantity. 
In  our  inquiry  as  to  the  specific  duties  which  one  being  may  owe 
to  another,  we  shall  have  frequent  occasion  to  refer  to  the  prin- 
ciples already  enunciated. 

Ethics  is  an  inductive  science.  We  have  so  far  studied  the 
moral  nature  of  man  by  direct  observation,  and  the  propositions 
set  forth  generally  have  been  such  as  could  be  verified  by  each 
one  in  a  simple  act  of  introspection  or  have  been  directly  de- 
duced from  such  observation. 

In  our  inquiry  as  to  the  specific  activities  which  human  duty 
requires,  the  processes  of  our  study  will  be  as  truly  inductive 
as  in  any  natural  science.  The  field  which  furnishes  us  the 
ground  of  our  inductions  has  several  divisions:  (i)  The  con- 
stitution, physical  and  psychical,  of  the  normally  developed 
man.  The  possession  of  any  capacity,  impulse,  or  passion  in 
mature  manhood  is  an  indication,  could  we  but  read  aright,  of 
the  life  which  at  some  time  the  man  is  designed  to  live.  Note 
the  provision,  could  we  but  read  aright.  It  is  very  easy  to 
err  in  our  judgment  of  the  significance  of  a  given  propensity 

109 


no  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

of  one's  self.  Every  impulse  is  an  impulse  to  act,  and  to  act 
now.  There  is  neither  reflection  nor  forethought  in  appetite 
or  emotion.  They  crave  their  objects  immediately;  not  alone 
when  they  minister  to  our  well-being,  but  when  they  may 
become  agents  of  destruction.  Near  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  some  philosophers  having  grasped  the  thought  that 
the  impulses  of  a  being  were  indications  of  the  proper  activities 
of  that  being,  raised  the  cry  of  "Back  to  nature."  We  have 
asked  that  human  impulses  be  studied  in  the  normally  developed 
man,  but  some  disciples  of  this  school,  carrying  their  theories 
into  pedagogy,  have  said  that  "the  desire  of  the  child  is  the 
voice  of  the  Infinite  saying  what  the  child  should  have."  No 
great  amount  of  testing  this  theory  is  necessary  in  order  to  show 
its  absurdity.  The  child  desires  pie,  ergo  he  needs  pie;  he  wants 
pie  now,  ergo  given  him  pie  now;  he  wants  much  pie,  ergo  give 
him  the  whole  pie.  Your  ten-year-old  boy  wants  money,  ergo 
leave  your  pocketbook  on  the  table  and  tell  him  to  help  himself. 
Seldom  will  you  find  a  better  example  of  "answering  a  fool 
according  to  his  folly"  than  the  suggestion  of  J.  S.  Mill,  that  the 
possession  of  a  given  impulse  is  so  far  from  furnishing  a  warrant 
for  its  gratification  that  it  would  be  an  equally  valid  inference, 
that  our  impulses  were  given  us  to  be  resisted.  We  will  not 
discuss  the  relative  merit  of  the  two  errors,  but  insist  that  nor- 
mal human  nature  must  be  taken  into  account  by  him  who  would 
explore  the  field  of  human  duty.  If  any  one  ask,  "Who  deter- 
mines the  normally  developed  man?"  we  answer  you  do. 
Nor  will  the  perverted  ideals  of  a  few  conscienceless  desperadoes 
any  more  trouble  you  in  fixing  upon  the  best  type  of  character 
than  the  existence  of  a  few  Flathead  Indians  will  prevent  your 
forming  a  judgment  as  to  the  normally  developed  human  body. 
Our  estimate  of  any  being  must  take  into  account  what  he  is 
fitted  to  become,  as  well  as  what  he  is  now.  In  any  induction 
you  may  make  regarding  human  duty,  if  you  would  know  the 
weight  which  you  should  give  to  the  presence  of  any  appetite 
or  passion,  you  should  observe  the  place  of  that  impulse,  not 
in  the  immature  and  petulant  child,  not  in  the  vicious  criminal, 
not  in  the  one-sided  hobbyist  with  a  theory  to  maintain,  but 


INTRODUCTION  in 

in  the  man  who  in  self  poise  and  symmetry  of  character  im- 
presses you  as  "the  all  around  man." 

(2)  We  have  seen  that  conclusions  based  on  our  observation 
of  the  human  constitution  are  liable  to  error;  it  is  permissible 
to  rest  in  such  conclusions,  only  when  they  stand  the  test  of 
examination  in  the  second  field  of  our  inductions  which  is: 
the  experience  of  men  in  society.  We  have  assumed  that  hu- 
man well-being  is  an  end  in  morals.  Ethics  is  no  respecter  of 
persons;  one  man  is  just  as  worthy  of  consideration  as  another 
and  no  more.  It  would  be  easy  to  make  a  code  for  Robinson 
Crusoe.  A  man  so  situated  would  have  no  occasion  to  reflect 
as  to  how  his  conduct  might  affect  anyone  but  himself.  But  we 
know  that  very  few  will  live  that  isolated  life.  Some  reading 
the  book  of  Genesis,  have  wondered  at  the  simplicity  of  the  law 
given  to  Adam,  On  reflection  it  will  be  seen  that  the  Revised 
Statutes  of  the  United  States,  the  Code  of  Iowa,  or  even  the 
Ten  Commandments  would  have  little  application.  The  num- 
ber and  character  of  the  relations  in  which  one  man  stands  to 
his  fellow  must  always  be  the  important  factor  in  determining 
the  list  of  his  duties.  Living  in  society  as  he  does,  it  may  occur 
that  a  course  of  conduct,  well  adapted  in  some  respect  to  pro- 
mote one  man's  interest,  may  in  that  or  some  other  respect, 
be  fraught  with  mischief  to  his  neighbor.  For  example: 
living  in  the  country,  a  man  may  build  his  barn  next  the  road 
and  dump  the  refuse  out  at  the  front  door;  to  do  so  in  the  city 
is  fraught  with  peril  to  his  fellows.  In  such  cases  it  is  the 
problem  of  ethics  to  find  some  course  of  conduct  consistent 
with  the  well  being  of  each.  The  shifting  character  of  ethical 
codes  is  largely  due  to  the  changing  nature  of  human  relations. 

Ethical  history  takes  note  of  two  movements:  the  changes 
in  the  relations  actually  existing  among  men;  and  the  growth  in 
the  intelligence  of  men  in  the  recognition  of  these  relations. 
These  two  movements  do  not  always  coincide.  Our  moral 
perception  often  lags  behind  the  march  of  civilization.  If  our 
selfishness  makes  us  content  with  things  as  they  are,  it  is  very 
easy  to  close  our  eyes  to  the  new  duties  which  changed  condi- 
tions have  thrust  upon  us.  The  history  of  slavery  furnishes 


ii2  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

a  good  illustration.  There  was  a  time  when  war  seemed  the 
chief  business  of  mankind.  No  matter  how  well  disposed  an 
individual  might  be  the  stern  necessity  was  upon  him  of  spend- 
ing a  large  share  of  his  energies  in  defending  himself  against 
those  who  would  trespass  upon  him.  The  war  of  those  times 
was  relentless.  The  slaughter  of  the  vanquished  was  a  foregone 
conclusion.  To  lose  his  life  was  the  well  understood  forfeit 
of  being  beaten.  At  that  time  it  seems  to  have  been  the  happy 
thought  of  some  one  to  spare  the  life  of  his  captive,  and  set 
him  to  working  for  him.  Such  is  the  generally  accepted  account 
of  the  origin  of  human  slavery.  Thus  in  its  beginning  it  seems 
to  have  been  a  merciful  institution.  But  as  time  moves  on 
changes  occur  in  the  relations  of  nations.  Diplomacy  is  born. 

It  is  found  that  a  state  of  war  is  not  the  only  one  in  which 
nations  may  exist.  It  is  indeed  an  abnormal  condition,  and 
when  it  does  occur  humanity  suggests  means  of  softening  its 
atrocities,  without  affecting  the  relative  power  of  either  com- 
batant. Prisoners  need  not  be  slaughtered;  they  are  kept  for 
a  time  and  at  a  convenient  season  are  exchanged.  Clearly 
the  excuse  for  slavery  no  longer  exists,  but  ages  pass  before  men, 
who  had  found  property  in  human  flesh  profitable,  recognized 
the  changed  conditions. 

(3)  There  is  one  more  field  in  which  we  find  ground  for  our 
moral  judgments.  A  large  number  of  men  believe  that  a  Deity, 
supposed  to  be  benevolent  and  righteous,  has  supplemented  the 
knowledge  which  lay  within  the  grasp  of  unassisted  human 
understanding  by  an  authoritative  revelation  of  His  will, 
concerning  the  conduct  of  His  creature  man.  We  insisted  that 
moral  relations  do  not  originate  in  the  arbitrary  fiat  of  Deity. 
But  while  such  a  fiat  can  not  be  thought  of  as  the  source  of 
Tightness,  the  revealed  will  of  such  a  Deity  as  we  have  supposed 
may  well  be  believed  to  be  the  proof  of  rightness.  And  the 
simple  possibility  that  such  a  revelation  might  be  made  will 
lay  every  reasonable  man  under  obligation  to  attentively 
consider  the  probability  of  the  genuineness  of  any  purported 
revelation.  And  when  anyone  is  convinced  of  its  genuineness, 
he  is  bound  carefully  to  take  it  into  account  in  the  formation 


INTRODUCTION  113 

of  his  moral  judgments.  Indeed  neither  of  these  three  fields 
may  be  neglected  by  the  man,  who  would  know  the  whole 
truth  in  regard  to  human  duty.  Do  you  insist  that  it  is  possible 
to  solve  every  ethical  problem  by  the  exercise  of  the  intellect 
upon  the  data  of  human  experience?  Suppose  it  admitted: 
it  remains  true  that  the  process  is  a  tedious  one  and  that  in 
practical  life  men  often  find  questions  of  pressing  and  immediate 
importance  which  can  ill  afford  to  wait  on  the  tediousness  of 
such  a  solution. 

Under  such  circumstances,  to  reject  a  trustworthy  guide 
because  that  finally  the  intellect  might  be  equal  to  the  solution 
of  the  problem  would  be  folly,  comparable  to  that  of  an  engineer 
who  would  discard  the  use  of  a  table  of  logarithms  because  he 
knew  himself  able  to  prepare  one  himself.  On  the  other  hand, 
to  the  one  who  insists  that,  having  accepted  a  trustworthy 
revelation,  he  has  no  need  to  search  for  truth  in  other  fields, 
we  would  suggest  that  however  perfect  the  revelation  which 
God  has  made,  it  was  given  to  supplement,  not  to  supersede 
the  human  intelligence. 


CHAPTER  II 
DIVISION  OF  DUTIES 

DUTY  is  always  thought  of  as  owed  to  some  being.  This  fact 
suggests  the  ground  of  division  and  we  shall  classify  duties 
with  respect  to  the  beings  for  whose  sakes  the  particular 
activities  are  exerted  or  forborne.  Some  moralists  have  said 
that  a  man  owes  duties:  (i)  to  himself;  (2)  to  his  fellow  man; 
(3)  to  God;  (4)  to  brutes;  (5)  to  inanimate  nature.  We  shall 
treat  of  only  the  first  three  classes,  insisting  that  as  duty  can 
be  owed  only  by  a  moral  person  it  can  be  owed  only  to  a  being 
who  is  now  or  potentially  may  become  such  a  person.  Few 
will  contend  that  a  class  of  duties  to  "inanimate  nature" 
should  be  recognized.  It  is  true  that  there  are  activities  of 
doing  and  forbearing  which  terminate  on  forest  and  mine  and 
soil.  The  obligation  arises  out  of  the  existence,  present  or 
prospective  of  sentient  beings,  who  will  need  these  natural 
agents  for  sustenance.  It  is  these  sentient  beings,  men  like 
ourselves,  to  whom  we  owe  the  duty  of  conserving  the  resources 
of  the  earth.  The  case  is  by  no  means  so  clear  for  throwing 
out  the  class  of  "  duties  to  the  brute."  It  must  be  freely  con- 
ceded that  much  can  be  said  in  favor  of  the  position  that 
while  personality  is  the  characteristic  of  the  beings  who  owe 
duties,  sentience  is  the  essential  mark  of  those  to  whom  duties 
may  be  owed.  We  are  not  prepared  to  say  dogmatically  that 
a  man  never  does  owe  any  duty  to  a  brute,  neither  do  we  affirm 
that  he  does.  One  who  so  affirms  will  find  that  it  leads  him 
into  very  perplexing  difficulties  as  soon  as  he  attempts  to  say 
what  those  duties  are.  Those  religious  fanatics  who  a  few 
years  since  turned  their  oxen  loose  in  the  wilderness  and  pro- 
ceeded to  cultivate  their  farms  with  spade  and  hoe,  had  only 
accepted  with  honesty  the  logical  consequence  of  conceding 
that  man  does  owe  duty  to  the  brute.  We  leave  the  question 
an  open  one,  but  observe  that  most  of  the  cases  of  supposed 

114 


DIVISION  OF  DUTIES  115 

duty  to  the  brute  are  of  a  negative  character  to  the  effect  that 
I  shall  refrain  from  giving  the  brute  unnecessary  pain  "  or  from 
acting  toward  him  with  "cruelty  or  wantonness."  The  poet 
insists  that  I  shall  "step  aside  and  let  the  reptile  live."  He 
would  hardly  have  insisted  that  I  was  obligated  to  exert  myself 
to  provide  that  reptile  the  means  of  subsistence.  For  all  these 
kind  forbearings,  for  all  the  compassionate  instruction  given  to 
children,  for  all  the  good  work  of  the  Society  for  the  Prevention 
of  Cruelty  to  Animals,  we  have  nothing  but  commendation, 
but  insist  that  for  all  these  activities  there  are  other  and  weightier 
obligations  than  can  arise  from  the  relations  of  man  to  the 
brute  creation.  In  another  place  attention  was  called  to  the 
weakness  of  McCaulay's  smart  criticism  of  the  Puritan,  that 
"he  was  opposed  to  bear-baiting,  not  because  it  gave  pain  to 
the  bear,  but  because  it  gave  pleasure  to  the  spectators." 
Perhaps  McCaulay  saw  no  evil  in  the  bear  garden,  except  the 
suffering  of  the  bear,  but  it  is  well  for  civilization  that  there 
were  those  who  saw  the  effect  on  the  character  of  the  spectators. 
A  certain  moral  teacher  gives  this  account  of  an  experience  of 
his  own:  "One  Fourth  of  July  morning  I  saw  on  the  street  a 
crowd  of  men  and  boys  who  had  induced  a  large  mastiff  to 
attack  a  lighted  bunch  of  fire  crackers.  To  them  it  seemed 
rare  sport  to  see  the  courageous  brute,  after  each  explosion, 
with  bleeding  mouth  renew  the  attack.  You  will  say  that  I 
had  a  duty  then  and  there.  I  agree,  nor  will  we  differ  as  to 
what  my  duty  was.  It  was  my  duty  to  protest  against  that 
whole  brutish  business.  There  may  be  a  difference  of  opinion 
as  to  the  object  of  my  obligation.  Was  my  protest  a  duty  to 
the  dog?  If  you  contend  that  it  was  I  will  not  argue  the  case, 
but  do  insist  that  my  far  weightier  obligation  was  to  my  fellow 
men  who  were  there  imbruting  themselves." 

Nor  does  it  affect  the  case  as  to  the  object  of  his  duty  that 
the  condition  of  the  dog  excited  his  pity,  and  the  conduct  of 
the  men  aroused  his  indignation.  With  a  good  degree  of 
sympathy  for  those  of  you  who  think  that  Dobbin  and  Towser 
should  have  a  place  in  your  scheme  of  moral  conduct,  we  still 
prefer  to  divide  duties  into  three  classes,  believing  that  every 
case  of  obligated  conduct  is  either  (i)  a  duty  to  self,  (2)  a  duty 
to  one's  fellow  man,  or  (3)  a  duty  to  God. 


CHAPTER  III 
DUTIES  TO  SELF 

To  some  it  may  seem  strange  that  a  man  should  owe  duties  to 
himself.  In  the  popular  thought  of  duty  the  term  is  reserved 
for  activities  directed  to  the  well  being  of  another,  and  it  is  in 
relation  to  duties  of  that  sort  that  the  moral  consciousness  of 
most  men  makes  itself  known.  A  little  reflection,  however, 
will  justify  our  assertion  that  a  man  does  owe  duties  to  himself. 
No  reason  can  be  given  why  in  his  scheme  of  beneficent  action 
he  should  ignore  himself.  As  a  matter  of  fact  in  many  realms 
he  will  not  do  so.  One  trouble  with  the  world  has  seemed  to 
be  that  the  activities  of  most  men  are  too  self  regarding.  To 
such  regard  a  man  is  impelled  by  inherent  instincts  and  passions. 
To  such  an  extent  is  this  true  that  a  large  share  of  his  effort,  if 
he  would  be  even  a  decent  man  among  his  fellows,  is  directed  to 
holding  in  check  his  self  regarding  impulses.  If  there  are  any 
of  these  activities  to  which  the  man  might  appropriately  be 
impelled  by  a  sense  of  obligation,  you  certainly  have  there  a 
case  of  duty  to  self.  If  it  appear  to  a  man  that  by  his  nature 
he  is  fitted  to  become  in  any  respect  a  better  man  than  he  is 
now,  it  is  inevitable  that  he  should  feel  obligated  to  attempt  to 
realize  that  improved  type  of  manhood.  However  he  may 
disregard  it,  he  must  feel  upon  him  the  pressure  of  the  "eternal 
ought"  asserting  that  he  should  be  that  kind  of  a  man.  Here 
is  certainly  a  duty  to  self.  The  moral  feelings  of  self  approval 
and  self  reproach  will  testify  to  the  same  thing  to  each  of  us. 
If  two  goods  have  been  presented  to  me  and  I  have  knowingly 
chosen  the  lower,  I  cannot  do  otherwise  than  reproach  myself 
for  having  so  chosen.  I  will  do  this  whether  any  other  one  is 
affected  by  my  choice  or  not.  It  has  sometimes  been  asked, 
What  duties  would  a  man  have  were  he  alone  in  a  world  all 
his  own?  Indeed  his  code  would  be  a  meager  one,  and  would 

116 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  117 

consist  chiefly  of  negative  precepts,  but  these  would  be  as 
rigidly  enforced  in  his  moral  consciousness  as  any  precepts 
could  be.  They  would  pertain  largely  to  the  satisfaction  of  his 
appetites.  He  could  not  but  condemn  himself  if  because  some 
article  of  food  "tastes  good"  he  should  so  overload  his  stomach 
as  to  sacrifice  health  to  appetite.  But  this  is  not  all.  His 
curiosity  would  be  excited  by  the  things  occurring  in  nature 
about  him.  He  could  not  but  consider  the  joy  of  knowing  a 
good.  It  is  possible  that  he  might  feel  himself  impelled  to 
seek  the  solution  of  some  of  the  mysteries  that  confront  him. 
If  so  he  owes  to  himself  the  duty  of  self  improvement.  It 
seems  probable  that  the  pioneers  in  science  made  their  first 
efforts  in  response  to  impulses  originating  in  the  manner  just 
indicated.  The  conduct  of  a  few  choice  spirits  shows  the 
existence  of  the  impulse,  while  the  ignorance  and  sloth  of  the 
common  herd  for  so  many  ages  bear  witness  to  the  sluggishness 
of  the  human  soul  in  its  response  to  the  obligation  to  self 
improvement. 

"Old  hermits  sought  for  solitude 
In  caves  and  desert  places  of  the  earth 

Where  their  own  heart  throb  was  the  only  sound  of  living  thing 
That  comforted  the  year. 

But  the  bare  pillared  top  of  Simeon  in  midnight's  blackest  waste 
Were  populous,  matched  'gainst  the  isolation  drear  and  deep, 
Of  him  who  pines  among  the  sons  of  men,  at  once  a  great  thought's  king 
and  prisoner." 

Thus  we  see  that  even  living  alone  a  man  would  not  be 
altogether  a  stranger  to  the  conception  of  duty.  But  it  must 
be  confessed  that  the  content  of  that  duty  would  be  meager. 
Man,  a  social  being,  will  owe,  even  to  himself,  duties  which 
man,  a  hermit,  a  solitary  animal,  could  never  know.  Does  his 
social  environment  render  possible  to  him  a  new  development? 
May  he  now  in  any  respect  become  a  larger  man  than  before? 
If  so  there  is  a  duty  to  himself  to  become  that  kind  of  a  man. 

The  duties  a  man  owes  to  himself  will  be  of  two  kinds,  so 
made  by  the  different  kinds  of  good  which  their  respective 
performance  effects.  There  is  good  of  condition  and  good  of 
character.  As  a  result  of  his  superior  mental  endowment  man 


n8  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

alone  of  earthly  beings  is  able  to  appreciate  in  any  degree  good 
of  character.  For  the  same  reason  his  appreciation  even  of 
good  of  condition  seems  better  and  more  discriminating.  And 
he  is  capable  of  something  which  at  times  rises  to  the  dignity 
of  moral  conduct  in  the  choices  he  makes  of  physical  good: 
some  kinds  of  food,  clothing,  shelter,  exercise  are  better  than 
others:  better,  too,  measured  in  other  terms  than  those  of 
immediate  satisfaction.  It  will  be  found  that  it  is  in  the 
choices  made  in  this  realm  that  the  development  of  the  moral 
nature  in  most  cases  really  begins.  Although  good  of  character 
may  never  be  sacrificed  to  good  of  condition,  let  no  one  despise 
those  duties  which  pertain  to  the  bodily  life. 

(i)  It  is  a  man's  duty  to  live  as  long  as  he  can  consistent 
with  his  regard  for  the  higher  good  of  character.  We  would 
not  ignore  the  fact  that  life  may  be  risked  in  the  service  of  one's 
fellows.  Many  are  the  cases  where  "he  who  would  save  his  life 
shall  lose  it."  The  character  that  developed  in  self  denying 
service  is  an  infinitely  higher  good  than  the  mere  prolonging  of 
a  few  more  days  of  breathing.  But  this  does  not  affect  the 
truth  of  our  general  proposition  that,  under  the  condition 
named,  a  man  is  obligated  to  live  as  long  as  he  can.  He  has 
no  right,  by  overt  act  or  by  recklessness  or  even  by  indifference, 
to  cut  short  his  stay  in  the  body.  In  the  belief  that  the  suicide 
is  necessarily  insane  it  has  become  our  almost  universal  custom 
to  look  on  him  with  nothing  but  pity.  Were  our  assumption 
correct  this  would  be  the  right  attitude.  But  there  are  indica- 
tions that  the  suicide  is  not  always  irresponsibly  insane.  We 
are  appalled  at  the  increase  in  the  number  of  suicides  in  recent 
years,  and  in  many  cases  there  is  intelligence  which  was  capable 
of  weighing  consequences,  and  there  are  also  indications  that 
their  impulses  were  not  beyond  the  control  of  the  will.  There 
do  come  times  in  many  lives  when  it  appears  that  to  lapse 
into  unconsciousness  might  be  desirable.  Shakespeare  makes 
Hamlet  speak  true  to  human  nature  in  his  soliloquy.  In  his 
thought  he  has  reduced  the  pain  of  dissolution  to  a  minimum 
and  he  is  only  deterred  from  taking  his  own  life  by  the  uncertain 
character  of  the  dreams  that  "may  come  when  we  have  shuffled 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  119 

off  this  mortal  coil."  Evidently  two  things  are  the  recognized 
deterrents  of  the  would-be  suicide :  one  the  instinctive  shrinking 
from  the  pain  of  dying,  the  other  the  apprehension  of  an 
unknown  somewhat  in  a  conscious  state  after  death.  But 
medical  science  has  shown  the  possibility  of  a  well  nigh  painless 
death,  and  account  for  it  as  we  may  we  cannot  close  our  eyes 
to  the  fact  that  in  some  circles  there  has  been  a  decay  of  faith 
in  human  immortality.  The  changes  in  these  respects  will 
account,  in  a  large  measure,  for  the  increase  in  the  number  of 
those  who  take  their  own  lives.  In  the  troubles  which  have 
beset  them  they  call  for  our  sympathy,  but  in  choosing  to 
throw  away  their  lives  rather  than  face  their  duties  they  are 
blameworthy.  Let  it  be  persistently  taught  that  a  man  owes 
it  as  a  duty  to  himself  to  live  as  long  as  he  can,  and  he  cannot 
without  guilt  intentionally  cut  short  his  stay  on  earth.  Reck- 
lessness regarding  one's  own  life  marks  a  low,  rather  than  a 
high,  state  of  civilization.  It  is  difficult  to  state  exactly  the 
circumstances  which  will  call  for  the  sacrifice  of  one's  life,  but 
it  would  seem  that  it  is  only  when  some  effort  has  in  it  the 
possibility  of  saving  the  life  of  another,  or  of  making  other 
lives  stronger,  larger  or  richer  in  some  important  respect  that 
a  man  is  justified  in  assuming  extraordinary  risk.  All  honor 
to  those  who  in  quest  of  that  knowledge  which  is  giving  us 
the  control  of  disease  have  risked  and  even  sacrificed  their  lives 
but  contempt  mingles  with  pity  for  those  who  seek  notoriety 
by  walking  tight  ropes,  making  dangerous  balloon  ascensions, 
and  fighting  furious  animals.  If  you  say  that  there  is  something 
in  human  nature  which  craves  the  excitement  of  those  spectacles 
where  danger  to  human  life  is  imminent,  we  answer  yes  in  some 
natures,  but  insist  that  it  is  a  morbid  and  depraved  nature. 
Before  you  seek  to  justify  the  jeopardy  of  a  human  life  you 
must  show  some  end  to  be  accomplished  of  greater  importance 
than  the  amusement  of  a  sensation  loving  rabble. 

There  is  another  offense  against  one's  life  which  does  not 
pass  by  the  name  of  suicide.  We  reserve  that  term  for  those 
who  have  intentionally  sought  the  sudden  termination  of  their 
lives.  But  there  is  real  guilt  when  a  man  in  the  pursuit  of 


120  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

either  wealth  or  pleasure  enters  upon  a  course  of  conduct 
which  he  knows  will  shorten  life.  Work  of  either  hand  or 
brain  is  healthy,  and  the  world's  work  ought  to  be  so  done, 
and  we  believe  could  be  so  done,  that  the  life  of  the  toiler  would 
not  be  shortened  thereby.  There  is  in  every  organism  a  con- 
stitutional capacity  to  run  some  certain  length  of  time.  The 
attempt  has  been  made  to  find  the  ratio  of  this  time  to  the  time 
of  the  animal's  development  to  maturity.  Results  are  yet  in 
doubt,  but  if  you  will  appeal  to  your  own  knowledge  of  domestic 
animals  you  will  be  struck  with  the  persistence  of  the  ratio  of 
one  to  five.  It  may  yet  be  shown  to  be  a  fairly  safe  generaliza- 
tion that  the  period  of  an  animal's  development  is  about  one 
fifth  of  the  period  of  its  normal  life.  There  is  enough  in  this 
to  raise  the  question:  Why  should  not  a  man  live  to  be  a 
hundred  years  old?  Life  may  have  been  shortened  more  than 
it  need  to  have  been  to  have  justified  the  ancient  bard  in 
saying:  "The  days  of  our  years  are  three  score  and  ten  years." 
We  have  become  familiar  with  the  phrase,  "the  strenuous  life." 
Whatever  else  it  may  mean  we  may  be  sure  that  a  strenuous 
life  is  a  discounted  life. 

(2)  Under  the  same  limitations  heretofore  mentioned  it  is 
a  man's  duty  to  live  as  comfortably  as  he  can.  Some  may 
question  the  propriety  of  making  mention  of  this  as  a  duty, 
thinking  that  self  interest  without  any  regard  to  obligation 
will  prompt  a  man  to  avail  himself  of  all  the  provisions  which 
nature  has  placed  within  his  reach  whereby  he  may  add  to  his 
comfort.  Sometimes  this  is  true,  but  not  always.  We"  have 
all  laughed  at  the  case  of  the  native  reported  by  the  "Arkansas 
Traveler"  who  did  not  repair  his  roof  in  rainy  weather  because 
he  would  get  wet  in  so  doing,  nor  yet  in  dry  weather  because  he 
did  not  need  it  then.  The  case  is  more  than  a  caricature. 
Human  inertia  is  often  a  great  obstacle  to  human  comfort. 
You  might  with  propriety  press  upon  the  attention  of  our 
Arkansas  friend  a  moral  obligation  to  take  care  of  himself; 
to  make  use  of  some  of  the  timber  growing  in  abundance  about 
him.  To  make  some  shingles  and  to  repair  his  leaky  roof  was 
more  than  a  privilege;  it  was  a  duty  to  himself. 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  121 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  in  his  ability  progressively  to  turn 
to  account  natural  agents  and  forces,  for  the  satisfaction  of  his 
wants,  man  is  far  in  advance  of  every  other  form  of  life.  Given 
the  same  environment,  each  species  of  beast,  bird  or  insect 
will  shelter  itself  and  procure  its  food  in  the  same  manner 
from  one  generation  to  another.  The  honey  bee  builds  her 
comb  just  as  she  did  when  Virgil  sang  her  praises.  The  beaver 
builds  his  dam  and  the  robin  her  nest  just  as  their  ancestors 
did  in  prehistoric  times.  It  were  trite  to  tell  you  how  man  in 
his  progress  from  barbarism  to  civilization  has  improved  his 
dwelling,  his  clothing  and  the  preparation  of  his  food.  I  only 
call  your  attention  to  the  fact  that  to  do  so  was  his  duty. 
Nor  have  we  any  reason  to  think  that  nature's  store  is  exhausted. 
Read  Romans  8:19-22.  "  Made  subject  to  vanity ' '  (uselessness , 
emptiness)  well  states  the  fact  in  regard  to  steam,  electricity 
and  many  other  things  in  their  relation  to  human  well  being 
for  centuries.  Who  can  tell  what  other  materials  and  forces 
for  a  time  made  "subject  to  emptiness"  may  yet  be  let  loose 
when  the  Creator  shall  see  a  regenerated  humanity  capable  of 
using  them  beneficently? 


CHAPTER  IV 
DUTIES    TO    SELF  — CONTINUED 

The  Appetites 

AMONG  the  sensibilities  we  noted  the  class  called  Appetites. 
They  have  certain  characteristics:  i.  They  are  spontaneous 
in  their  manifestation  as  experienced  by  us.  As  to  external 
gratification  they  are  largely  under  the  control  of  the  will, 
but  as  physical  cravings  they  arise  not  only  when  we  would, 
but  when  we  would  not.  2.  Though  known  by  us  as  physical 
cravings,  they  have  their  origin  in  a  condition  of  the  bodily 
organism.  3.  Their  function  is  to  secure  either  the  normal 
healthy  life  of  the  body  or  the  perpetuity  of  the  race. 

Not  all  of  them  have  received  names.  Some  are  designated 
by  naming  the  object  of  the  craving.  We  enumerate :  Hunger, 
Thirst,  Motion,  Rest,  Sleep  and  Sex.  The  end  of  the  appetite  in 
the  animal  economy  seems  to  have  been  secured  by  making  its 
gratification  pleasurable.  The  continuance  of  life  would  have 
been  impossible  had  the  appropriation  of  the  means  of  living 
been  obliged  to  await  the  development  of  rationality  sufficient 
to  command  the  doing  of  an  act  either  unpleasant  or  indifferent; 
and  here  it  is  to  be  observed  that  the  very  possibility  of  living 
opens  the  way  to  the  most  serious  consequences  to  any  being 
designed  for  anything  higher  than  the  brute  life. 

Long  ago  Aristotle  gave  us  his  conception  of  man  as  "an 
animal  which  lives  according  to  reason. "  Nowhere  is  the  dis- 
tinction here  noted  more  marked  than  in  the  different  places 
which,  by  the  consensus  of  opinion  of  all  thinking  men,  the 
appetites  seem  designed  to  hold  in  the  human  and  in  the  brute 
economy.  The  appetites  are  common  to  man  and  beast. 
In  brute  life  appetite  is  supreme.  You  expect  nothing  else. 
Excitation  is  the  sufficient  reason,  and  satiety  the  only  limit 
you  fix  to  indulgence.  All  the  impulsive  cravings  of  the  brute 

122 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  123 

life  are  in  man,  but  you  demand  that  in  his  case  the  impulse 
must  be  tried  at  the  bar  of  reason.  The  obligation  to  so  try  it 
will  be  admitted  by  every  one  who  is  not  ready  to  affirm  that 
man  is  at  liberty  to  live  as  the  brute  lives.  What  rationality 
is  expected  to  do  for  the  mature  man,  instruction,  discipline 
and  parental  control  are  supposed  to  supply  in  the  case  of  chil- 
dren and  youth.  It  might  be  interesting  for  each  one,  with  our 
list  of  appetites  in  mind,  to  note  how  much  of  the  education  of 
children  and  youth  in  conventional  good  manners  and  decency 
is  directed  to  the  placing  of  the  appetites  under  the  control 
of  the  will,  and  the  assignment  of  them  to  their  proper  place 
in  a  rational  scheme  of  life.  The  appetites  are  obtrusive. 
In  their  cravings  they  are  imperious.  As  President  Porter 
says  of  them:  "They  are  pre-eminently  self  centered.  They 
ask  nothing  as  to  consequences  to  other  beings."  He  might 
have  added,  nor  of  consequences  to  one's  self  in  the  future.  In 
the  brute  we  are  satisfied  with  this.  We  expect  him  to  satisfy 
his  hunger  and  thirst;  to  move,  to  sleep  and  to  lust  with  no 
restraint  except  that  imtoosed  by  superior  force.  Let  a  man 
do  likewise,  and  you  charge  him  with  debasing  himself.  In- 
deed our  common  use  of  language,  which  often  holds  in  it  the 
apt  expression  of  philosophic  truth,  has  just  one  phrase  in 
which  to  describe  the  man  with  unbridled  appetite:  "He  is 
making  a  beast  of  himself."  His  conduct  is  "brutish." 

If  we  are  to  reconcile  the  existence  of  this  animal  nature  of 
man  with  the  higher  life,  which  we  feel  that  he  is  made  to  live, 
we  must  provide  for  the  satisfaction  of  the  appetites,  in  a  moder- 
ate, rational,  and  beneficent  manner.  We  would  not  for  one 
moment  pose  as  an  advocate  of  either  covetousness,  sloth  or 
lust;  they  are  the  crying  sins  of  this,  as  of  perhaps  every  age. 
Ten  sermons  should  be  preached  against  them  where  a  single 
word  is  said  of  the  character  of  that  which  is  now  spoken. 
Because  it  is  the  truth  we  say  it:  Every  young  man  is  under  a 
moral  obligation  to  find  some  avenue  of  effort  in  which,  by 
toil  of  hand  or  of  brain,  he  may  provide  himself  with  "bread 
to  eat  and  raiment  to  put  on. "  We  believe,  too,  that  we  might 
with  propriety  add  that  for  the  great  majority  a  happy  mar- 


124  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

riage  in  its  own  good  time  is  also  one  of  the  things  for  which 
provision  should  be  made. 

It  is  foolish  for  one  to  say  that  his  life  is  his  own  and  that  if 
he  choose  to  throw  it  away  by  a  failure  to  provide  for  its  wants, 
it  is  no  one's  business.  He  can  not  throw  away  his  wants. 
He  will  not  be  so  indifferent  when  actual  want  stares  him  in 
the  face.  The  man  without  provision  for  the  necessary  wants 
of  the  body  is  a  burden  upon  and  a  menace  to  the  good  order 
of  society. 

It  is  not  our  purpose  to  consider  each  of  the  appetites  separ- 
ately, but  to  make  such  general  observations  as  will  apply  to  the 
whole  class,  though,  as  will  readily  be  seen,  with  greater  force  to 
some  than  to  others. 

The  importance  of  the  appetites  to  our  well  being  may  be 
seen  by  imagining  them  left  out  of  the  human  economy.  An 
infant  would  have  to  be  forced  to  take  his  food,  and  the  sponta- 
neous movements  of  the  body  would  have  to  be  replaced  by 
artificial  ones.  As  already  indicated  the  pleasure  attached  to 
these  activities  seems  designed  to  secure  the  necessary  action 
until  maturing  reason  is  capable  of  giving  direction. 

But  that  the  appetites  should  be  brought  under  control 
is  indicated  by  the  fact  that  their  unbridled  indulgence  plunges 
the  individual  into  the  depths  of  misery.  Nor  does  he  alone 
suffer  the  results  of  his  overindulgence.  If  we  could  banish 
from  the  earth  all  the  sickness,  pain,  and  sorrow  due  to  the 
unrestrained  and  irrational  gratification  of  some  one's  appetites, 
the  world  would  be  a  much  pleasanter  place  to  live  in. 

It  is  clearly  desirable  if  possible  to  find  some  rule  in  accord- 
ance with  which  the  satisfaction  of  the  appetites  may  be  made 
to  serve  human  well  being  and  not  become  a  means  of  de- 
struction. This  rule  has  been  proposed:  All  appetites  are  to  be 
gratified  with  reference  to  the  end  for  which  they  are  placed  in 
the  human  constitution.  For  example,  it  is  said:  "Eat  to 
live,  do  not  live  to  eat. "  There  can  be  no  doubt  as  to  the  cor- 
rectness of  the  principle  here  enunciated,  yet  its  application 
may  not  always  be  as  simple  a  matter  as  might  at  first  be  sup- 
posed. Two  widely  different  views  may  each  claim  the  sane- 


DUTIES   TO   SELF  125 

tion  of  the  rule.  According  to  the  first,  an  appetite  is  to  be 
gratified,  solely  and  only,  to  the  extent  that  is  absolutely  neces- 
sary for  securing  its  end.  To  illustrate:  I  am  hungry.  Now 
the  fact  that  I  crave  some  particular  kind  and  portion  of  food 
which  is  before  me  is  no  warrant  for  my  eating  it.  As  a  rational 
being  with  the  aid  of  the  chemist  and  physiologist  let  me  ascer- 
tain just  how  much  of  each  variety  of  food  is  necessary  to  repair 
the  waste  of  the  body,  then  eat  that  much  and  no  more.  And 
lest  I  may  be  tempted  to  overeat,  let  my  food  be  of  the  coarsest 
sort.  If  two  articles  equally  wholesome  are  before  me  on  the 
table,  take  the  less  palatable,  lest  I  may  be  guilty  of  a  needless 
indulgence.  Am  I  thirsty;  "clear  cold  water  is  the  drink  for 
me. "  Do  not  put  in  it  any  tea,  coffee,  or  lemon  juice.  Inju- 
rious or  not  they  are  condemned  by  the  fact  that  they  add  noth- 
ing to  the  power  of  the  water  to  quench  thirst,  which  is  the  sole 
end  sought.  Their  use  serves  only  to  increase  the  pleasure  of 
ating  and  drinking,  and  that  motive  I  must  resolutely  trample 
under  foot. 

Now  many  will  dismiss  this  view  of  the  matter  with  one 
contemptuous  word:  "asceticism."  But  giving  a  doctrine  a 
name  does  not  make  it  either  worse  or  better.  Let  the  rose 
arid  the  dogfennel  change  names:  each  under  the  new  name 
would  possess  its  former  characteristics.  In  favor  of  this  inter- 
pretation of  the  rule,  there  are  several  things  that  may  be  urged: 

(1)  When  men  are  to  be  trained  for  feats  of  strength  or 
skill,  in  which  it  is  desired  that  the  organism  in  some  of  its 
parts  shall  be  at  its  best,  they  shape  their  habits  by  rules  of 
training  that  very  much  resemble  this.    The  purpose  is  to  cut 
off  not  only  that  which  is  pernicious,  but  the  superfluous  also. 
There  is  an  example  of  the  application  of  this  view  of  our 
principle,  in  the  training  tables  of  athletic  teams.     More  than 
once  when  uttering  a  protest  against  what  seemed  the  excesses 
of  college  sport,  the  author  has  been  told  of  the  benefits  which 
certain  young  men  have  received  from  the  discipline  of  the 
training  table. 

(2)  There  are  many  of  earth's  greatest  and  best  men 
whose  rules  of  living  were  much  like  the  one  we  are  considering. 


126  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Diogenes,  Socrates,  Augustine,  St.  Benedict,  St.  Francis, 
Loyola,  Peter  the  Great,  William  of  Orange,  John  Knox,  and 
John  Wesley  may  challenge  the  apologist  for  a  pampered 
appetite  to  produce  a  like  list. 

(3)  Adherence  to  this  interpretation  of  our  principle  is  a 
sure  method  of  accomplishing  one  thing  greatly  to  be  desired. 
A  man  so  living  becomes  the  absolute  master  of  his  appetites. 
There  is  a  moral  grandeur  in  the  man  who  can  say,  "I  keep 
under  my  body  and  bring  it  into  subjection."  So  desirable  is 
this  end  that  if  it  could  only  be  attained  in  the  observance  of 
this  extreme  rule,  we  should  advocate  its  adoption.  Nor 
should  the  man  who  desires  the  highest  things  in  character  be 
deterred  from  its  acceptance  by  the  fact  that  the  saying  is  a 
hard  one  and  that  it  offends  the  common  herd.  Majorities  do 
not  count  in  morals. 

But  we  believe  that  the  adoption  of  this  extreme  interpre- 
tation of  our  rule  is  not  necessary  to  the  attainment  of  the 
most  perfect  discipline,  and  that  it  is  open  to  a  serious  objection. 
It  assumes  that  there  are  sensibilities  whose  gratification  is 
presumptively  evil.  We  have  seen  that  the  generic  element  in 
the  "good"  is  a  gratified  sensibility.  We  may  fairly  hold 
that  the  presumption  —  note  that  we  say  presumption  —  no 
more — is  in  favor  of  the  beneficence  of  every  craving  of 
the  soul.  It  is  only  as  it  comes  in  competition  with  some 
higher  good  that  any  sensibility  must  be  repressed.  The 
pleasure  of  a  gratified  sensibility,  while  it  cannot  stand  for  a 
moment  as  an  excuse  for  its  exercise  in  the  face  of  a  probable 
damage  either  to  one's  self  or  another,  is  a  justification  for  its 
exercise  in  the  absence  of  such  evil.  We  assert  as  the  second 
view  under  our  principle  that  "an  appetite  may  be  gratified 
at  any  time  and  to  any  extent  in  the  absence  of  a  reason  to  the 
contrary."  An  ancient  moralist  seems  to  have  held  this  view 
for  he  says,  "  My  son,  eat  thou  honey  because  it  is  good,  and  the 
honey  comb  because  it  is  sweet  to  the  taste."  Prov.  34:13- 
Does  this  teach  unlimited  gratification?  The  example  of  the 
author  of  it  might  lead  you  to  think  so  but  he  was  only  another 
example  of  those  moralists  who  can  teach  better  than  they 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  127 

practice,  for  hear  him  again:  "Hast  thou  found  honey?  eat  so 
much  as  is  sufficient  for  thee  lest  thou  be  filled  therewith  and 
vomit  it."  The  example  here  cited  —  that  of  a  child  with  his 
craving  for  sweets — is  fairly  typical  in  both  its  permissions  and 
its  limitations  of  the  whole  class  of  appetites.  Most  of  us  can 
remember  our  own  childhood's  craving  for  candy,  sugar, 
molasses,  honey,  jam,  and  preserves;  some  of  us  remember 
how  irksome  were  the  restraints  laid  on  our  indulgence.  Now 
the  teaching  of  this  author  would  be  that  the  child's  craving, 
the  pleasure  of  his  gratified  taste,  is  a  sufficient  reason  for  his 
indulgence  to  the  point  where  a  higher  good,  in  this  case  the 
child's  health,  rises  on  the  scene.  This  one  case  may  stand  for 
all.  According  to  this  view,  if  I  am  hungry  and  in  the  presence 
of  food,  the  presumption  is  that  I  may  eat.  If  there  are  two 
kinds  of  food  before  me  the  presumption  is  that  I  may  eat 
that  which  tastes  the  better.  And  it  will  require  some  positive 
reason  to  set  these  presumptions  aside.  Let  it  not  be  for- 
gotten that  there  is  a  possibility  of  such  a  reason  arising  and 
that  reason  of  a  very  imperative  character.  The  food  may 
not  be  mine;  or  perhaps  my  neighbor  needs  it  worse  than  I  do: 
it  may  be  of  a  sort  damaging  to  health;  any  one  of  a  score  of 
reasons  may  exist  wherefore  I  may  not  eat.  Our  only  claim 
for  the  rights  of  a  normal  appetite  is  this:  that  my  craving 
raises  a  presumption  in  favor  of  gratification,  and  the  case 
must  be  made  against  it  before  I  am  certainly  obligated  to 
abstain.  If  all  reformers  would  recognize  this  truth,  it  is 
possible  that  some  of  their  wholesome  rebukes  might  not 
arouse  the  resentment  which  they  do.  Nothing  conduces 
more  to  good  feeling  in  a  discussion  than  the  generous  recog- 
nition of  the  rights  of  your  opponent.  We  would  not  have 
any  one  abate  one  whit  of  his  zeal  against  the  practices  of  the 
glutton,  the  sluggard,  the  drunkard  and  the  libertine.  We 
only  ask  him  to  accept  his  proper  place  in  the  controversy. 
The  burden  of  proof  is  on  the  reformer.  He  must  make  his 
case  against  the  supposed  excess  before  he  can  expect  the 
devotee  of  pleasure  to  abandon  his  indulgent  practices. 

We  may  fairly  claim  for  the  view  here  advocated  the  prac- 


128  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

deal  advantage  of  simplicity.  It  is  easier  to  detect  the  injurious 
than  to  be  assured  of  the  absolutely  necessary.  It  will  be 
observed  that  this  view  leaves  an  ample  field  for  the  develop- 
ment of  character  in  the  mastery  of  the  appetites.  To  say 
that  an  appetite  may  be  gratified  in  the  absence  of  a  reason  to 
the  contrary  leaves  us  free  to  insist  ever  so  strongly  on  its 
suppression  in  the  presence  of  such  a  reason.  That  reason 
may  rest  in  the  fact  that  the  supposed  indulgence  involves  a 
risk  to  health  or  a  sacrifice  of  character,  or  is  productive  of 
injury  to  another.  Even  when  no  one  of  these  results  may  be 
certainly  foreseen,  it  is  enough  to  put  one  on  inquiry  if  the 
proposed  indulgence  involves  a  violation  of  those  rules  estab- 
lished either  by  the  civil  law  or  by  the  conventions  called  good 
manners  for  the  government  of  human  beings  in  society. 

Most  of  the  cases  for  the  restriction  of  the  indulgence  of 
the  appetites  will  fall  under  a  few  general  heads:  (i)  An 
appetite  is  not  to  be  artificially  stimulated.  Such  stimulation 
can  hardly  fail  to  react  upon  the  organism.  We  cannot  too 
strongly  condemn  the  practices  of  those  cooks  and  housewives 
whose  purpose  would  seem  to  be,  not  the  satisfaction  of  the 
appetites  of  hungry  men,  but  the  stimulation  of  the  palate  of 
those  who  have  already  eaten  sufficiently.  The  inducing  of 
sleep  by  the  use  of  opiates  is  a  practice  so  dangerous  that  the 
good  physician  even  in  cases  of  necessity  will  use  it  with  caution. 
If  a  man  is  not  hungry  at  meal  time  or  is  not  sleepy  at  bed  time, 
there  is  some  abnormal  condition  of  the  organism  to  which 
attention  should  rather  be  given. 

(2)  An  appetite  is  not  to  be  indulged  at  any  time  or  in 
any  manner  which  will  impair  the  capacity  of  any  organ  of  the 
body  for  its  normal  activity.    Health  is  always  a  higher  good 
than  any  of  the  pleasures  of  sense.    A  good  digestion  is  better 
than  mince  pie. 

(3)  In  conformity  with  what  has  already  been  said  of  the 
subordination  of  good  of  condition  to  good  of  character  we 
observe  that  every  indulgence  of  appetite  is  to  be  resolutely 
suppressed  when  it  tends  to  establish  a  habit  which  weakens  in 
any  way  the  forces  of  the  moral  nature.     Certain  artificial 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  129 

appetites,  like  those  for  alcohol  and  narcotics,  are  always  of 
this  character.  They  become  cravings  against  which  the  will 
seems  well  nigh  powerless.  No  man  can  afford  to  have  an 
appetite  for  his  master. 

(4)  Appetites  are  to  be  gratified  with  careful  consideration 
of  the  happiness  present  and  prospective  of  others.  We  can 
do  no  better  at  this  point  than  to  quote  the  words  of  President 
Porter:  "The  appetites  are  all  eminently  self  centered,  and 
are  necessarily  exclusive  and  in  a  certain  sense  repellent  of 
the  claims  of  the  appetites  of  other  men.  If  undisciplined  and 
unrestrained  they  easily  lead  to  open  disregard  of  their  interests 
and  claims,  if  not  into  open  assaults  upon  them  in  insulting 
manners  and  violent  deeds.  Obtrusive  greediness  in  eating 
and  drinking  give  offense  even  when  there  is  enough  for  all. 
Any  bodily  preoccupation  whether  pleasurable  or  painful 
much  more  in  forms  that  are  extreme,  as  of  heat  or  cold,  starva- 
tion and  thirst,  presents  the  strongest  impulses  to  some  unhand- 
some neglect  or  forge tfulness  of  our  fellow  men.  This  exclu- 
sive and  self  centering  power  is  fearfully  illustrated  in  conditions 
of  man's  great  extremity  as  in  shipwreck  and  impending  death. 
This  natural  tendency  is  enormously  increased  when  the  appetite 
is  voluntarily  accepted  as  the  master  and  tyrant  of  the  man. 
Gluttony,  intemperance  and  licentiousness  are  notoriously 
selfish  and  cruel  when  they  become  acknowledged  and  absorbing 
passions.  Let  them  encounter  a  rival  or  a  foe  and  their  subject 
becomes  not  only  a  brute  in  his  degradation  but  a  brute  in  his 
cruel  hate  if  disappointed  or  opposed  in  his  gratification.  No 
fact  is  better  attested  by  universal  and  obvious  experience  than 
that  the  appetites  not  only  trample  into  the  mire  the  most 
tender  of  natural  affections  but  that  they  inspire  man  with 
fiendish  hate  toward  those  who  would  reform  or  resist  his 
brutish  impulses."  Against  this  dark  portrayal  of  the  evils 
of  unbridled  appetite  we  would  set  before  the  reader  the  fact 
that  history  bestows  its  choicest  laurels  on  the  men  who  have 
been  able,  even  in  extremities,  to  subordinate  their  appetites 
to  more  worthy  impulses.  Sir  Philip  Sidney  has  been  immor- 
talized, not  by  the  product  of  his  pen,  though  he  was  an  author 


i3o  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

of  no  small  degree  of  merit;  not  by  his  deeds  of  valor,  though 
he  was  a  brave  soldier,  but  by  an  incident  in  the  closing  hours 
of  his  life.  Every  schoolboy  knows  the  story.  Mortally 
wounded  and  being  carried  from  the  field,  an  attendant  brought 
him  a  cup  of  water;  just  as  he  put  it  to  his  lips  his  eyes  caught 
the  longing  look  of  a  wounded  private  soldier  lying  by  the 
roadside.  He  pushed  the  cup  aside,  saying:  "Give  it  to  him, 
his  necessity  is  greater  than  mine." 

The  unsocial,  I  had  almost  said  the  antisocial,  character 
of  the  appetites  has  led  men  to  make  laws  which  on  occasion 
restrict  their  indulgence.  Even  more  than  law;  we  have  in 
every  civilized  society  a  body  of  customs  and  usages,  which 
embody  the  wisdom  and  experience  of  generations.  Let  no 
one  imagine  that  the  etiquette  of  table  manners  and  the  con- 
ventions of  society  relating  to  the  respect  which  the  sexes  are 
to  show  to  each  other  are  mere  arbitrary  restrictions.  Back 
of  most  of  them  there  is  a  reason  for  their  observance.  The 
presumption  is  overwhelmingly  in  their  favor  and  it  is  reck- 
lessness, almost  unpardonable,  for  immature  youth  to  set 
them  aside  without  a  most  careful  inquiry  into  their  reason  for 
being.  With  changing  conditions  some  of  them  may  indeed 
be  found  to  be  outworn,  but  until  condemned  in  the  open  court 
of  reason,  they  should  bind  the  conscience  with  all  the  authority 
of  moral  law. 

(5)  Whenever  possible  the  satisfaction  of  appetite  should 
be  made  to  contribute  to  pleasures  of  a  higher  order.  The  hog 
eats;  so  does  the  man,  but  it  is  a  grave  reproach  to  the  man  to 
say  that  "he  eats  like  a  hog."  "The  life  is  more  than  meat"; 
the  dinner  is,  or  ought  to  be,  more  than  a  "feed."  It  is  to  this 
end  that  we  eat  at  a  table  instead  of  each  in  his  corner  and 
that  we  have  our  social  events  with  the  tables  spread  with  all 
the  appointments  of  good  taste. 

The  application  of  these  rules  will  require  the  exercise  of 
common  sense  and  discretion.  Though  we  seek  for  simplicity 
in  our  rules  of  living  we  cannot  hope  altogether  to  avoid  diffi- 
culty. That  difficulty  is  increased  in  every  case  where  the 
pressure  of  appetite  is  strong.  To  the  man  with  an  intense 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  131 

craving  for  any  satisfaction  it  is  not  hard  to  find  a  refracting 
medium  for  the  moral  judgment.  It  is  very  hard  for  the  man 
given  to  appetite  to  say  like  the  scientist:  "What  care  I  what 
the  truth  may  be  so  only  that  it  is  the  truth?"  Some  may  think 
that  there  would  be  an  advantage  in  more  definite  codes  grant- 
ing this,  forbidding  that.  This  is  properly  done  for  childhood; 
but  with  maturing  intelligence  shall  not  man  indeed  become 
"an  animal  living  according  to  reason"  in  the  ordering  of  his 
life?  Against  the  consequences  of  the  grosser  and  confessedly 
most  injurious  forms  of  indulgence  society  has  sought  to  pro- 
tect itself,  not  so  much  by  "sumptuary  legislation"  as  by  the 
conventional  customs  of  modesty  and  good  manners  of  which 
we  have  spoken.  These  at  most,  however,  touch  only  a  small 
portion  of  a  man's  life.  By  far  the  greater  number  of  questions 
relating  to  what  I  shall  eat  or  drink,  when  and  how  I  shall  take 
my  sleep,  rest  or  exercise  are  left  to  my  individual  judgment; 
and  there  we  would  have  them  left,  only  insisting  that  it  shall 
be  the  judgment  enlightened  by  careful  study,  and  relieved  of 
the  warping  bias  of  present  passion. 


CHAPTER  V 

DUTIES  TO  SELF  — CONTINUED 
Duties  Relating  to  the  Character  —  The  Intellect 

THE  discussion  of  the  topic  of  this  chapter  leads  us  back  to 
the  thought  that  frequently  the  same  concrete  act  may  be 
included  in  all  three  classes  of  duties.  The  Samaritan  finds  the 
wounded  Jew  by  the  wayside :  the  most  obvious  duty  is  one  to 
his  fellow  man,  but  it  is  easily  seen  that  if  he  is  a  devout  man 
he  will  feel  this  duty  likewise  enforced  by  a  sense  of  obligation 
to  God.  Further  if  he  has  reflected  on  the  end  of  his  own  being, 
if  he  has  set  up  an  ideal  of  the  kind  of  a  man  he  ought  to  be 
and  become,  he  will  owe  it  to  himself  to  help  this  wounded  Jew. 
Indeed  I  may  find  that  every  act  which  is  primarily  a  duty  to 
my  fellow  man  or  to  God  is  in  a  secondary  sense  a  duty  to 
myself  also  since  the  doing  or  not  doing  affects  my  character. 
The  question  has  sometimes  been  asked  whether  there  are  any 
duties  of  a  man  to  himself  with  respect  to  his  character  which 
are  not  primarily  duties  to  God  or  to  his  fellow  man.  Ascetics 
of  all  creeds  have  said  yes.  Utilitarian  philosophy  emphati- 
cally answers  no.  In  this,  as  in  so  many  other  disputed 
problems  in  philosophy,  it  is  probable  that  there  is  a  truth 
which  lies  at  the  foundation  of  each  one's  one-sided  judgment. 
The  question  is  one  of  speculative  interest  almost  entirely. 
Seldom,  if  ever,  will  we  find  it  necessary  to  go  outside  the  realm 
of  practical  life  in  quest  of  "spiritual  gymnastics"  and  yet 
there  are  doings  and  forbearings  of  which  the  most  immediate 
result — the  most  prominent  in  your  consciousness  —  is  the  effect 
on  your  own  habits  and  soul  life.  If  that  effect  is  beneficent  it 
may  well  become  an  end  in  our  activities.  If  we  have  appre- 
hended the  blessedness  of  holy  being,  and  have  in  mind  that 
we  owe  it  to  ourselves  to  become  the  very  best  sort  of  beings 
of  which  we  are  capable  of  becoming,  we  will  certainly  con- 

132 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  133 

elude  that  it  is  a  duty  to  ourselves  to  avail  ourselves  of  every- 
thing within  our  reach  which  may  aid  us  in  the  realization  of 
that  end.  As  such  an  aid  we  would  name  an  improved  Intellect. 
That  we  may  see  how  the  improvement  of  the  intellect  is 
related  to  the  moral  life  let  us  review  for  a  moment  some  of 
our  previous  discussion.  We  denned  Character  as  the  attitude 
of  the  soul  toward  righteousness  made  permanent  by  activities 
of  will.  Consider  attentively  the  terms  of  this  definition:  (i)  It 
is  an  attitude  of  the  soul.  It  belongs  essentially  to  the  per- 
sonality itself.  Obscure  as  this  may  seem  we  can  say  little  to 
make  it  clearer.  We  would  if  possible  make  plain  that  the 
character  which  we  seek  to  define  is  not  of  the  nature  of  a 
polish  or  veener  which  for  prudential  reasons  may  be  laid  upon 
the  forms  of  speech  or  action.  It  belongs,  so  to  speak,  to  the 
very  texture  of  the  self.  It  is  an  attitude  of  the  soul.  (2)  This 
attitude  is  one  which  has  come  to  have  some  degree  of 
permanence.  It  cannot  be  called  character  if  it  is  an  attitude 
from  which  the  soul  can  be  driven  by  every  shifting  breeze  of 
passion.  (3)  This  permanence  has  been  established  by 
activities  of  the  will.  It  is  a  self-determined  attitude.  The 
choices  may  have  been  few  or  many;  they  may  have  been 
made  against  greater  or  less  resistance,  or  may  have  accorded 
with  the  man's  natural  tendencies:  but  the  element  of  conscious 
self-determined  commitment  must  have  entered  into  the  man's 
experience  before  you  can  affirm  character  of  him. 

There  is  a  distinct  moral  gain  whenever  men  are  induced 
to  choose  rightly.  Religious  revivals,  even  of  the  most  super- 
ficial nature,  do  accomplish  some  good.  They  all  have  in 
them  this  element  that  men  are  led  to  make  choices,  to  commit 
themselves  for  the  right. 

(4)  This  permanent  self-directed  attitude  of  the  soul  is 
toward  righteousness,  i.e.,  with  reference  to  righteousness. 
Of  course  it  is  toward  righteousness  as  the  man  sees  righteous- 
ness, and  here  is  where  intellect  is  of  service  to  character. 
Righteousness,  as  some  one  has  truly  said,  is  "Tightness  in 
action."  We  have  seen  that  Tightness  is  either  formal  or 
material.  Formal  Tightness  is  subjective  and  consists  in  the 


134  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

choice  of  that  which  has  commended  itself  to  the  judgment  as 
the  fitting  thing  to  be  done.  Material  Tightness  on  the  other 
hand  is  objective.  That  is  materially  right  which  as  a  matter 
of  fact  is  the  appropriate  or  fitting  thing  to  be  done.  Evidently 
because  of  the  fallibility  of  human  judgment  formal  Tightness 
may  issue  in  material  wrongness  and  the  righteous  man  is 
always  grieved  when  he  finds  that  such  has  been  the  case. 
He  may  comfort  himself  with  the  thought  that  he  did  the  best 
he  knew,  but  he  must  always  wish  that  he  had  known  better. 
The  man  who  has  attained  a  correct  attitude  toward  righteous- 
ness, not  only  does  the  right  as  he  sees  the  right,  but  he  earnestly 
desires  and  tries  to  know  what  the  right  thing  is.  Now,  that 
knowing  is  an  intellectual  act,  and  the  better  the  intellect  the 
better  the  possibility  of  the  man's  knowing.  It  may  be  said 
that  there  have  been  men  of  powerful  intellect  who  have  shown 
great  moral  stupidity.  Admitted,  but  in  every  such  case  the 
man  is  condemned  more  severely  than  the  mediocre.  There  is 
weighty  condemnation  in  the  saying  "he  ought  to  have  known 
better."  My  eyesight  may  be  ever  so  good,  but  if  I  do  not 
look  out  at  the  window  I  do  not  see  the  landscape.  The 
offense  of  the  reputedly  brilliant  man  who  showed  moral 
stupidity  is  that  he  did  not  turn  his  intellectual  power  in  the 
direction  of  moral  discernment  in  the  matter  in  question.  It 
is  unfortunate  that  so  many  men  are  content  to  pass  through 
life  receiving  at  second  hand  their  moral  judgments  without 
question.  The  victims  of  the  Salem  witchcraft  craze  would 
never  have  been  burned  had  their  judges  thought  to  subject 
their  traditional  belief  in  witchcraft  to  the  test  of  their  own 
intelligence.  In  more  than  one  crisis  the  cause  of  truth  has 
suffered  as  much  from  men  of  "reprobate  minds"  (literally 
minds  void  of  judgment)  as  from  men  of  corrupt  hearts. 

We  believe  the  reader  is  prepared  to  concede  the  obligation 
of  a  man  to  cultivate  the  intellect,  not  alone  because  that 
intellectual  power  is  a  good  of  a  high  order,  but  for  the  use  he 
may  make  of  that  power  in  the  discernment  of  moral  relations. 
Obvious  as  this  may  now  seem  to  us,  but  few  people  compara- 
tively have  even  thought  of  it. 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  135 

It  is  unfortunate  that  the  advocates  of  scholarship  so  often 
present  such  partial  views  of  the  obligation  to  seek  intellectual 
culture.  Students  are  frequently  warned  by  the  popular 
lecturer  to  beware  of  the  discouraging  idea  that  a  college 
education  will  interfere  with  their  success  in  gaining  money  or 
political  preferment.  He  will  show  you  that  while  not  more 
than  one  per  cent  of  the  people  are  college  graduates,  that  one 
per  cent  has  furnished  such  a  large  proportion  of  our  public 
men.  And  there  he  stops.  Possibly  there  is  a  time  in  the  life 
of  a  child  when  such  views  may  properly  be  presented,  but  we 
have  greatly  overestimated  the  intelligence  of  the  average 
high  school  graduate  if  he  is  not  able  to  apprehend  much  more. 
It  is  a  very  faulty  perspective  of  human  life  which  sees  in  the 
power  to  gain  knowledge  only  a  means  of  procuring  more 
things  to  eat  and  wear;  more  time  to  sleep,  game  or  rest. 

From  this  error  several  bad  conditions  have  arisen: 

1.  School  work  has  become  hateful.    A  man  cannot  provoke 
merriment  any  more  surely  than  by  suggesting  to  a  body  of 
students  that  they  are  so  anxious  to  get  to  their  lessons  that 
they  cannot  patiently  listen  to  his  second-hand  jokes.    And 
yet  we  know  that  in  all  seriousness  this  ought  to  be  true. 

2.  Worse  still  there  is  a  tendency  to  relegate  all  specific  ef- 
fort at  mental  culture  to   the  schooldays.     We  divorce  the 
school  with  its  employment  from  what  we  term  "practical  life." 
We  congratulate  ourselves  that  we  have  placed  the  means  of 
intellectual  improvement  within  the  reach  of  the  poorest  of 
the  people;  but  we  must  confess  that  popular  interest  in  the 
matter  seems  woefully  in  arrears  of  those  improved  conditions. 
We  have  no  desire  to  prolong  the  period  of  school  attendance. 
The  time  soon  comes  when  the  young  must  enter  on  the  stage 
of  self  support;  but  we  do  protest  against  putting  a  period  to 
their  efforts  in  quest  of  intellectual  power.    Every  one  ought 
to  have  some  activity  aside  from  that  in  which  he  makes  his 
living,  which  shall  contribute  to  his  mental  growth.     Bear  in 
mind  that  mental  capacities  are  not  analogous  to  physical  as 
to  the  time  limit  in  the  period  of  their  development.    The 
body  has  a  period  of  growth  that  can  by  no  possibility  be 


136  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

exceeded.  It  may  not  be  at  the  same  age  for  each,  but  to 
every  one  there  does  come  a  time  after  which  he  absolutely 
cannot  grow  any  more.  Whether  he  is  five  feet  two,  or  six 
feet  seven,  he  cannot  by  taking  thought  add  one  inch  to  his 
stature.  Even  that  organ  of  the  body  most  nearly  related  to 
mental  processes  will  cease  to  grow.  There  is  a  weight  of 
brain  that  each  will  reach  and  never  exceed.  Whether  he 
wears  a  No.  6  or  a  No.  7^  hat,  whether  his  brain  weighs  sixty- 
two  or  thirty-six  ounces,  he  will  come  to  a  time,  and  that  com- 
paratively early  in  life,  when  not  another  grain  can  be  added 
to  its  weight.  But  there  is  no  such  limit  to  the  soul's  capacity 
to  grow.  Let  every  man  continue  to  grow  and  not  think  of 
stopping  until  his  friends  are  ready  to  order  his  coffin.  And  he 
will  have  use  for  all  the  intellectual  power  he  can  secure  in  the 
solution  of  the  moral  problems  that  will  come  before  him. 
Probably  this  would  be  the  last  reason  which  most  persons 
would  assign  for  the  training  of  the  intellect.  It  is  a  common 
error  to  suppose  that  right  and  wrong  are  so  easily  seen  that 
for  the  correct  life  no  great  amount  of  discernment  is  necessary. 
That  view  takes  account  of  only  one  aspect  of  Tightness.  It 
does  not  require  any  great  mental  power  for  a  man  to  choose 
that  which  he  for  any  reason  has  accepted  as  right,  for  the 
reason  that  choosing  is  not  an  intellectual  act  at  all.  The 
most  untutored  savage  can  choose  to  do  or  not  to  do  that 
which  his  judgment  has  approved  with  just  as  much  energy 
as  the  sage.  Not  so  his  power  to  determine  what  ought  to  be 
approved.  Let  any  man  or  woman  in  business  or  society  begin 
the  New  Year  with  the  resolution,  not  only  to  do  the  right  thing 
but  also  in  every  emergency  to  know  the  right  thing  to  do,  and 
before  the  grass  grows  and  the  birds  sing  he  will  have  problems 
that  call  for  all  the  discernment  he  can  command.  If  this  be 
true  regarding  those  matters  which  are  almost  wholly  personal, 
what  shall  we  say  of  the  man's  need  of  mental  acumen,  when 
he  is  called  to  choose  his  attitude  on  the  political,  economic, 
social  and  religious  problems  of  the  day?  Consider  the  num- 
ber of  unsolved  problems  that  are  to-day  in  the  public  mind. 
By  unsolved  we  mean  more  than  that  no  man  has  been  able 


DUTIES   TO   SELF  137 

to  induce  society  to  accept  his  solution  of  the  question.  We 
mean  that  no  sober  thinking  man  has  been  able  to  formulate 
a  solution  in  which  he  can  himself  rest  with  assurance.  There  is 
certainly  a  right  thing  to  be  done  about  the  "trusts"  if  we 
could  only  find  it.  The  glittering  generalities  of  the  average 
stump  speaker  show  that  he  does  not  know  what  it  is,  and  we 
believe  that  even  the  most  positive  of  the  aggressive  school  of 
Ex-President  Roosevelt  will  concede  that  his  measures  are  only 
partial  and  tentative.  Who  really  knows  what  to  do  about 
the  traffic  in  intoxicants  and  narcotics?  There  is  certainly  a 
best  thing  to  be  done.  But  with  the  most  intense  convictions 
that  something  drastic  must  be  done,  many  of  us  can  only 
see  far  enough  into  it  to  be  sure  that  some  things  (license  for 
example)  are  not  the  right  thing.  Most  of  us  are  in  a  similar 
condition  of  uncertainty  regarding  the  race  problem,  to  the 
solution  of  which  the  American  people  seem  no  nearer  to-day 
than  they  were  forty  years  ago.  In  our  church  life  we  might 
instance  the  question  of  the  proper  attitude  of  the  church  on 
popular  amusements.  There  are  only  two  classes  who  would 
seem  to  be  satisfied  with  their  own  attitude.  These  are,  on  the 
one  hand,  the  unblushing  devotees  of  "the  world,  the  flesh," 
etc.,  and  on  the  other  the  irrational  adherents  of  a  traditional 
puritanism.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  neither  of  these  classes  have 
really  thought  about  it  and  those  who  have  given  it  the  most 
attention  are  far  from  claiming  to  have  thought  their  way  through. 
"Who  is  sufficient  for  these  things?"  Our  twentieth  century 
civilization  needs  two  classes  of  great  men:  (i)  great  thinkers 
who  can  think  their  way  through  difficult  problems,  and  (2) 
great  leaders  who  will  have  not  only  ardor  of  conviction,  but 
manifest  "clearheadedness"  to  lead  humanity  along  the  trail 
that  the  thinkers  have  blazed  out  for  it. 


CHAPTER  VI 

DUTIES  TO  SELF  —  CONTINUED 
Duties  Relating  to  the  Emotions 

"  KEEP  thy  heart  with  all  diligence,  for  out  of  it  are  the  issues 
of  life."  Important  as  is  the  cultivation  of  the  intellect,  it 
must  yield  place  in  importance  to  the  cultivation  of  right 
habits  of  feeling.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  indifference  whether  or 
not  your  neighbor  is  an  ignoramus  or  an  intelligent  gentleman, 
but  it  is  of  vastly  greater  importance  that  he  shall  be  of  benefi- 
cent disposition,  of  a  tender  heart.  You  may  or  may  not  have 
use  for  his  knowledge;  you  are  sure  to  want  his  sympathy. 
You  will  not  find  the  real  man  in  the  achievements  of  cold 
intellect,  for  "as  a  man  thinketh  in  his  heart  so  is  he."  In  our 
estimate  of  ourselves  there  is  no  test  like  this:  if  we  would 
really  judge  ourselves  correctly,  we  will  measure  ourselves,  not 
by  the  things  we  say  and  do  under  the  eyes  of  our  fellows,  but 
by  the  hopes,  aspirations  and  emotions  to  which  we  abandon 
ourselves  in  our  moments  of  lonely  musing.  Such  abandon- 
ment may  involve  a  choice.  For  prudential  reasons  there  may 
be  no  external  action,  but  the  inner  self  is  surrendered  to  the 
dominance  of  the  given  emotion.  We  are  often  startled  by 
some  item  of  news  to  the  effect  that  some  one  of  previously 
good  repute  has  all  at  once,  by  social  vice  or  financial  defalca- 
tion, made  himself  an  outcast  from  society.  Men  hold  up 
their  hands  in  holy  horror  and  say:  "How  are  the  mighty 
fallen!"  Probably  the  man  was  not  mighty,  nor  at  this  time 
has  he  fallen  very  far.  Few  deeds  of  darkness  are  committed 
without  being  first  brooded  over  and  committed  over  and  over 
again  in  the  "chambers  of  his  imagery"  (Ezek.  8:1-12).  And 
even  in  those  cases  which  we  may  admit  to  be  instances  of 
unpremeditated  action,  the  effect  of  habits  of  feeling  was  not 
wanting.  There  come  crises  in  human  lives  when  the  accumu- 

138 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  139 

lated  results  of  feelings  cherished  for  years  come  crashing  upon 
men's  heads.  George  Eliot  in  portraying  one  of  her  charac- 
ters remarks:  "It  is  the  inexorable  law  of  human  souls  that  we 
prepare  ourselves  for  sudden  deeds  by  that  reiterated  choice 
of  good  or  evil  which  determines  character."  True,  there  is  a 
difference  between  robbing  my  employer's  money  drawer  and 
simply,  in  the  twilight,  gloating  over  the  imagined  pleasures  I 
might  obtain  with  the  money  there  is  in  it,  but  the  two  things 
do  have  this  in  common:  I  surrender  my  inner  self  to  the 
exercise  of  an  evil  passion.  "To  whom  ye  yield  yourselves 
servants  to  obey,  his  servants  ye  are."  "The  crises  of  great 
temptation  and  the  inspiration  of  golden  opportunity"  come 
seldom  in  any  one  life,  and  when  they  do  come  the  issue  is  in 
most  cases  determined  by  the  habits  of  feeling  indulged  and 
fostered  in  commonplace  affairs.  We  are  disposed  to  long 
for  great  opportunities  and  to  despise  in  petty  matters  the  care 
necessary  for  the  formation  of  the  right  temper  of  soul.  We 
would  be  Gideons,  putting  to  flight  the  hosts  of  Midian,  but 
forget  that  Gideon  was  called  "a  mighty  man  of  valor"  while 
threshing  wheat  behind  the  wine  press  (Judges  6:12).  We 
would  be  Davids,  securing  the  applause  of  shouting  thousands 
as  he  returns  victorious  from  the  battle  with  the  giant  of 
Gath,  but  forget  that  this  victory  was  made  possible  by  the 
moral  fiber  of  the  boy,  who  could  say:  "Thy  servant  kept  his 
father's  sheep  and  there  came  a  lion  and  a  bear  and  took  a 
lamb  out  of  the  flock,  and  I  went  out  after  him  and  smote 
him  and  delivered  it  out  of  his  mouth,  and  when  he  arose 
against  me,  I  caught  him  by  the  beard  and  slew  him:  thy 
servant  slew  both  the  lion  and  the  bear."  (I  Sam.  17:34  et  seq). 
The  most  trivial  affairs  of  human  life  become  momentous 
because  of  the  feelings  that  in  them  have  been  given  right  of 
way  in  our  lives. 

But  some  one  may  ask,  Is  it  possible  to  do  anything  in  the 
cultivation  of  right  habits  of  feeling?  Of  all  psychical  activities 
are  they  not  most  beyond  the  control  of  the  will?  It  is  true 
that  admiring  a  becoming  state  of  feeling,  or  even  resolving 
that  I  will  feel  in  a  given  manner,  are  usually  ineffective.  But 


140  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

there  are  things  that  I  can  do  which  will  have  an  indirect,  but 
no  less  powerful  effect  on  my  habits  of  feeling,  i.  I  can  make 
my  choice  accord  with  that  to  which  I  would  be  appropri- 
ately moved  by  the  better  emotion.  By  frequent  repetition 
it  will  be  found  that  this  habit  of  doing  will  react  upon  the 
habit  of  feeling.  This  result,  which  we  believe  patient  experi- 
ment will  verify,  is  one  which  we  might  expect  from  analogy  in 
the  matter  of  the  acquired  appetites  for  alcohol  and  tobacco. 
Not  only  is  there  no  craving  in  the  normal  constitution  for 
these  articles  but  there  is  a  decided  aversion  to  them,  which  as 
every  one  knows,  is  in  time  completely  overcome  and  reversed 
by  the  man  who  by  sheer  determination  does  repeatedly  choose 
to  chew,  smoke  or  drink.  It  would  be  strange  if  this  capacity 
to  change  propensities  applied  only  to  the  acquiring  of  bad 
habits.  2.  Emotions  are  always  called  forth  by  an  intellectual 
stimulus.  I  may  turn  my  attention  away  from  the  unbecom- 
ing stimulus.  It  belongs  to  the  disciplined  mind  to  control 
the  attention.  Thus  to  a  considerable  degree  I  can  control  my 
feelings,  by  the  control  of  the  objects  about  which  I  think. 
3.  I  may  place  before  myself  and  choose  as  mine  the  highest 
ideals  of  character.  4.  I  may  so  order  my  employment,  my 
associates,  my  reading  and  my  recreation,  that  the  higher 
emotions  will  be  kindled  and  the  lower  ones  repressed. 


CHAPTER  VII 
DUTIES  TO  SELF— CONTINUED 

Duties  Relating  to  the  Emotions — Amusements 

THE  admonition  contained  in  the  concluding  suggestion  of  the 
last  chapter  finds  its  most  important  application  in  our  attitude 
toward  that  class  of  activities,  undertaken  chiefly  for  the 
pleasurable  exercise  of  the  sensibilities,  which  are  excited  in 
and  by  them.  This  will  be  recognized  as  the  characteristic 
of  that  class  of  activities  to  which  the  name  amusements  has 
been  given.  Reference  has  been  made  to  the  amusement 
problem  as  unsettled  among  moralists.  Perhaps  no  question 
in  morals  has  been  the  occasion  of  more  acrimonious  discus- 
sion, which  leads  nowhere,  wanders  everywhere,  and  leaves  the 
disputants  more  at  variance  than  at  the  beginning.  There  is 
little  reason  to  hope  that  better  fortune  will  attend  any  new 
effort  at  elucidation,  yet  we  may  find  a  line  of  thought  not 
often  chosen  in  this  discussion.  Above  all  let  us  enter  it  with 
the  single  desire  to  know  the  truth  and  to  accept  the  truth 
without  any  regard  to  the  cherished  dogmas  assailed  or  the 
pleasant  practices  rebuked.  Preparatory  to  the  discussion  we 
may  note  a  few  things  to  which  there  will  be  general  agreement. 
In  all  probability  there  is  some  place  in  human  life  for  that 
class  of  activities  to  which  the  name  amusement  has  been 
given  —  that  is,  for  action  which  has  no  further  purpose  than 
to  excite  pleasurably  some  sensibility.  It  should  be  borne  in 
mind  what  has  already  been  said  of  the  significance  of  a  craving 
in  the  human  soul.  It  affords  a  presumption  that  there  is 
some  occasion  for  its  use.  It  says  nothing  of  the  time,  manner, 
or  extent  to  which  it  may  be  gratified.  It  only  affords  a  pre- 
sumption that  there  is  a  time  when  this  craving  may  be  gratified 
consistent  with  human  well  being;  yea,  when  human  well  being 
will  require  that  it  shall  be  gratified.  Now  aside  from  the 

141 


142  STUDIES   IN  MORAL   SCIENCE 

appetites  there  is  no  impulse  more  universally  manifesting 
itself  than  the  craving  for  amusement.  Go  where  you  will,  in 
some  manner  you  will  find  human  nature  asserting  its  appar- 
ently irrepressible  longing  for  action,  which  finds  its  sole  reward 
in  the  fact  of  action;  in  short  for  action  divorced  from  serious 
end.  It  is  the  work  of  human  intelligence  to  find  the  proper 
place  for  amusement  in  the  human  economy.  It  would  be 
strange  if  the  amusement  seeking  impulse  alone  should  be 
exempt  from  my  obligation  to  "live  according  to  reason."  As 
a  rational  being  I  am  obligated  to  find  some  principles  for  my 
guidance  in  this  as  in  other  things.  To  do  this  will  appear 
the  more  important  when  we  consider  the  effect  of  the  unre- 
strained quest  for  amusement  as  seen  in  human  experience. 
Outside  the  diversions  of  childhood  there  is  scarcely  a  clean 
page  in  it.  In  the  past  the  trail  of  the  serpent  has  lain  across 
the  whole  amusement  business.  Every  year  multitudes  of 
men  and  women  are  the  subjects  of  an  aroused  moral  conscious- 
ness. They  begin  new  lives  and  aspire  to  the  attainment  of 
higher  character.  Every  year,  too,  a  large  portion  of  these 
persons  in  a  short  time  lose  their  interest  in  the  best  things  and 
lapse  into  a  state  of  indifference.  In  a  large  percentage  of 
these  cases  you  will  find  that  some  form  of  amusement  has 
been  the  occasion  of  the  lapse.  Observing  this,  nothing  could 
be  more  natural  than  that  some  moralists  should  seek  to  set 
bounds  to  the  gratification  of  the  amusement  seeking  impulse. 
Notably  has  this  been  the  case  among  religious  moralists.  It 
need  not  surprise  us  if  their  procedure  should  reveal  the  same 
logical  fallacies,  the  same  doctoring  of  symptoms  before  search- 
ing for  causes,  which  has  characterized  the  progress  of  medical 
science.  Nothing  could  be  more  natural  than  that  these 
moralists  should  attack  those  specific  forms  of  amusement,  the 
indulgence  in  which  had  been  observed  so  frequently  to  be 
attended  with  those  moral  lapses.  Every  Evangelical  church 
(as  well  as  the  Roman  Catholic)  has  at  some  time  put  some 
form  of  amusement  under  ban.  These  prohibitions  have  not 
generally  been  the  result  of  a  narrow  asceticism,  nor  have 
they  emanated  from  a  desire  on  the  part  of  the  clergy  to  exploit 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  143 

their  authority  over  their  fellows.  They  have  been  made  in 
sincerity  of  soul  and  with  the  earnest  desire  to  promote  good 
character  in  the  members  of  their  flocks.  But  many  ecclesias- 
tical pronouncements  on  this  theme  are  inconsistent,  undis- 
criminating,  and  irrational.  Such  pronouncements  usually 
take  the  form  of  wholesale  prohibition  of  some  form  of  pleasur- 
able action.  The  things  most  frequently  condemned  are  the 
theater,  the  dance,  and  games  at  cards.  The  author  makes  no 
plea  for  these  institutions.  As  a  whole  their  effect  on  society 
is  bad,  and  it  would  be  difficult  to  show  good  reason  for  the 
continuance  of  any  one  of  them  in  its  present  form.  And  the 
effort  to  reform  them  appears  one  of  the  most  unpromising 
forms  of  beneficent  activity  ever  attempted  by  good  meaning 
men.  We  do  not  object  so  much  to  the  things  the  clergy  have 
done  as  to  the  manner  of  the  doing.  To  this  manner  we 
object:  (i)  It  appears  arbitrary;  it  interposes  before  the 
young  person  an  imperative  and  everlasting  "don't."  Instead 
of  furnishing  some  principle  for  my  guidance  it  substitutes 
authority  for  reason.  True  they  say:  "Let  these  things  alone 
because  they  are  bad,"  but  fail  to  show  wherein  their  evil 
consists,  and  straightway  our  young  pleasure  seeker  will  propose 
some  of  these  forms  of  amusement  under  conditions  in  which 
the  vicious  tendency,  if  it  exists  at  all,  is  very  remote.  (2)  The 
effect  of  the  very  minute  specification  of  certain  forms  of 
amusement  is  to  leave  me  without  any  caution  as  to  the 
others.  It  is  perhaps  true  that  there  are  some  forms  of  sport 
like  the  prize  ring,  for  example,  which  may  well  be  put  on  the 
moralists'  blacklist,  but,  when  we  undertake  to  make  a  special 
and  total  prohibition  of  those  whose  evil  consists  in  their 
excesses  and  accessories,  we  leave  the  way  open  for  the  intro- 
duction of  those  same  excesses  in  those  amusements  of  which 
you  have  said  nothing.  "Happy  is  that  man  who  condemneth 
not  himself  in  that  which  he  alloweth."  All  the  evils  of  the 
dance  may  be  seen  in  some  social  gatherings  of  people  who 
would  not  dance  for  the  world.  In  colleges  where  the  students 
are  forbidden  to  attend  the  theater  there  may  sometimes  be 
seen  in  class  and  society  exhibitions  things  which  have  in  them 


144  STUDIES  IN   MORAL  SCIENCE 

the  coarseness  of  the  low  grade  comedy.  What  substitutes 
too  we  have  had  for  games  at  cards.  Not  long  ago  the  author 
had  occasion  to  take  a  ride  of  some  fifty  miles  on  the  cars. 
Near  him  sat  a  company  of  four  young  people  of  good  families, 
and  of  at  least  conventional  piety.  It  appeared  that  they 
had  just  been  initiated  into  the  mysteries  of  the  newly  invented 
game  of  flinch.  No  sooner  had  the  train  started  than  a  suit 
case  was  turned  on  its  side,  and  in  a  few  moments  all  were 
intently  absorbed  in  the  game,  and  so  continued  for  the  hour 
and  a  half  of  the  journey.  It  was  evidently  enjoyable;  the 
best  of  feeling  prevailed  among  them,  the  rivalry  was  plainly 
good  natured  and  only  temporary.  The  suggestion  by  one 
that  the  losers  should  treat  to  the  oysters  when  they  should 
reach  the  city  was  at  once  turned  down  by  the  others.  Only 
a  cynic  could  have  grudged  those  young  people  the  hour's 
relief  from  the  tediousness  of  the  trip.  Just  across  the  aisle  sat 
a  company  of  four  commercial  travelers.  They  were  very 
gentlemanly  young  men,  and  they  likewise  sought  something 
to  take  the  edge  off  the  weariness  of  the  journey  on  the  slow 
train.  Their  resort  was  a  game  of  cards.  They  enjoyed  it. 
Their  rivalry,  too,  was  plainly  only  temporary  and  there  was 
not  even  a  suggestion  that  any  stake,  however  trivial,  should 
be  played  for.  Let  it  be  understood  that  we  are  not  defending 
the  card  players  nor  condemning  the  flinch  players,  but 
simply  stating  the  facts  as  we  saw  them.  The  two  things 
seemed  to  us  very  much  alike.  Whatever  of  good  there  was 
in  the  game  of  flinch  to  the  one  company  was  equally  in  the 
game  of  cards  to  the  other.  Whatever  possibility  of  evil 
there  was  in  the  game  of  cards  to  the  one  company  was  equally 
in  the  game  of  flinch  to  the  others.  Yet  ordinary  ecclesiastical 
rules  would  not  disapprove  the  conduct  of  the  first  company, 
but  would  condemn  that  of  the  card  players.  It  seemed  to 
the  author  that,  approving  one,  consistency  would  have  closed 
his  mouth  in  attempting  to  rebuke  the  other.  Those  advo- 
cating the  present  position  of  most  Evangelical  churches  on  the 
subject  will  tell  you  that  the  cards  are  instruments  of  gambling, 
and,  as  Christians,  one  should  shun  the  very  appearance  of  evil, 


DUTIES   TO   SELF  145 

they  should  let  those  instruments  of  gambling  alone  under  all 
circumstances.  But  in  this  case  the  game  of  flinch  had  pre- 
sented to  one  person  the  temptation  to  gamble  for  a  trivial 
stake,  while  four  persons  had  played  the  game  at  cards  without 
any  suggestion  of  gambling.  The  effort  to  settle  the  amuse- 
ment problem  by  a  set  of  rules  specifically  forbidding  this  and 
allowing  that,  seems  doomed  to  failure.  That  which  is  con- 
demned may  on  occasion  be  innocent,  while  that  which  is 
permitted  may  at  some  time  be  fraught  with  peril.  What  I 
need  as  my  bones  are  hardening  into  manhood  is  not  a  set  of 
minute  prohibitions  and  permissions,  such  as  might  be  used  in 
the  control  of  small  children,  but  some  rational  principles  for 
my  individual  guidance,  by  which  I  may,  as  occasion  arises, 
intelligently  determine  what  I  may  do  and  from  what  I  should 
abstain.  In  our  search  for  such  principles  we  may  find  some 
fundamental  facts  that  the  ecclesiastical  moralist  has  gener- 
ally missed.  And  first,  what  is  the  end  of  the  amusement 
seeking  impulse  in  the  human  economy?  Is  there  any  reason 
why  this  craving  so  prominent  in  the  brute  should  hold  also 
such  a  prominent  place  in  the  human  constitution?  We  will 
answer  this  question  affirmatively  if  we  can  find  some  beneficent 
result  which  its  presence  accomplishes.  We  do  not  push  our 
inquiry  very  far  until  we  find  it.  We  have  seen  that  a  high 
degree  of  capacity  for  rational  living  differentiates  the  mature 
human  animal  from  the  brute.  But  we  find  also  that  the 
very  young  human  animal  is  no  more  capable  of  rationally 
directed  activity  than  is  the  colt  or  the  kitten.  Rationalization 
is  gradual  and  tedious.  At  some  time  this  irrational  being 
must  put  on  rationality,  but  what  is  the  young  human  animal 
to  do  for  action,  not  of  body  alone,  but  of  the  mind  also,  pend- 
ing the  process?  The  play  impulse  is  nature's,  yea  the  Creator's, 
answer  to  the  question.  It  does  for  the  mind  what  the  instinc- 
tive and  reflex  movements  of  infancy  do  for  the  body.  It 
makes  sure  of  necessary  action  both  of  body  and  mind  while 
rationally  directed  activity  would  be  an  impossibility.  The 
use  of  the  impulse  suggests  its  limitations.  With  the  growth 
of  rationality  we  may  expect  the  craving  for  play  to  take  a 


i46  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

subordinate  place  in  human  life.  More  and  more  as  the  days 
come  and  go  and  pass  into  years  we  may  expect  the  life  to  be 
rationalized.  More  and  more  action,  prompted  by  the  love 
of  a  momentary  pleasurable  thrill,  gives  place  to  action  which 
is  prompted  by  a  far-reaching  beneficent  purpose.  How  far 
shall  this  go?  Shall  the  whole  life  be  rationalized?  Seldom 
perhaps  in  human  experience  has  that  goal  been  reached. 
But  who  would  venture  to  give  a  negative  answer  to  our  query? 
No  good  reason  can  be  assigned  why  any  portion  of  the  life  of 
the  mature  man  should  not  have  in  view  some  rational  end. 
Some  one  has  said:  "The  ideal  state  is  one  in  which  the  man 
can  find  pleasure  in  that  which  he  commands  himself  to  do." 
Surely  the  serious  employments  of  mature  life  will  furnish  the 
man  of  earnest  purpose  a  sufficient  variety  of  activity,  and  we 
are  justified  in  insisting  that  the  complete  rationalization  of 
life  is  a  consummation  to  be  wished,  an  end  to  be  aimed  at, 
and  whose  realization  is  to  be  expected.  It  is  at  this  point 
that  our  religious  moralists  have  so  often  fallen  short.  They 
have  not  grasped  the  thought  of  the  temporary,  the  provisional 
character  of  all  the  activities  to  which  the  term  amusement  can 
properly  be  given.  Very  much  may  be  permitted  to  the  youth 
if  he  understands  that  he  is  expected  to  outgrow  it  as  he  does 
his  knee  pants,  which  would  be  sadly  out  of  place  in  mature 
life.  We  would  have  every  one  whose  soul  has  been  thrilled 
with  the  desire  to  attain  the  best  things  in  character  under- 
stand that  he  is  to  expect  the  time  to  come  (and  the  sooner 
the  better)  when  purposeless  activity  is  to  be  replaced  by  that 
which  is  purposeful;  that  is  by  energy  purposely  directed  to 
useful  ends.  In  short,  we  would  have  him  recognize  amusement 
as  something  which  he  is  to  outgrow. 

It  will  be  interesting  at  this  point  to  name  the  several 
classes  of  people  for  whom  amusement  of  some  kind  would 
seem  appropriate:  (i)  The  very  young.  Play  should  fill  the 
larger  portion  of  the  child's  life.  We  may  expect  that  his 
passage  to  rationality  should  be  analogous  to  his  infantile 
waking  to  consciousness.  The  infant  for  a  few  moments  has 
his  attention  fastened  on  some  prominent  object  and  then 


DUTIES  TO  SELF  147 

lapses  into  forgetfulness  and  slumber.  Our  ten-year-old  boy 
will  have  his  heart  thrilled  for  an  hour  with  the  idea  of  acquiring 
wealth  or  fame,  or  knowledge  or  character,  and  straightway 
lapses  into  a  condition  of  purposeless  activity  —  play  —  and  this 
is  right.  But  modern  pedagogy  has  not  been  content  to  leave 
the  child  alone  to  his  spontaneous  action.  It  has  laid  its 
hand  upon  his  plays  and  said  that  they  shall  contribute  to  a 
purpose.  In  the  kindergarten  and  primary  school  it  seeks  to 
supply  a  purpose  in  the  child's  activities.  But  note  you  the 
purpose  is  in  the  mind  of  the  teacher,  not  in  the  child's:  the 
child  makes  little  piles  of  beans  and  incidentally  learns  the 
decimal  system  of  notation.  From  the  child's  standpoint  it  is 
play,  from  the  teacher's  it  is  work.  We  may  well  rejoice  in 
the  improvement  in  primary  methods  while  objecting  to  the 
idea  that  all  life  is  a  kindergarten,  and  if  childhood  must  make 
reprisal  on  mature  years  and  snatch  back  in  sport  the  time 
out  of  which  it  has  been  tricked,  we  could  wish  that  childhood 
had  been  given  more  fully  and  honestly  to  play  and  manhood 
left  for  earnest  work.  The  primary  teacher  points  with  pride 
to  her  prodigies  of  infantile  learning.  What  wonderful  things 
those  children  learned  when  they  thought  they  were  playing! 
But  she  has  unwittingly  taught  an  error  if  the  child  has  been 
led  to  regard  as  the  necessary  incentive  to  action  the  pleasurable 
thrill  that  only  some  action  can  give.  He  is  not  half  prepared 
to  live  until  he  can  hold  himself  to  an  effort  which  is  even 
painful  as  a  means  to  an  end  for  a  good  that  is  yet  to  be.  You 
have  utterly  failed  in  the  boy's  education  unless  by  the  time 
his  beard  has  grown  the  impulsive  life  of  childhood  is  giving 
place  to  that  which  is  rational;  unless  he  has  found  motives 
for  his  activity  which  are  higher  than  the  joys  of  present 
sensation  or  passion. 

(2)  The  very  ignorant  must  be  amused.  There  are  those 
to  whom  nature  is  a  sealed  book.  They  are  unable  to  appreciate 
anything  in  science,  literature,  or  history.  They  have  abso- 
lutely no  wholesome  interest  in  anything  aside  from  the  avoca- 
tion at  which  they  earn  their  bread.  Frequently,  too,  that  has 
become  hateful  to  them.  I  can  understand  that  to  such  a 


148  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

man  some  form  of  amusement  might  serve  to  keep  him  from 
dying  of  dry  rot. 

(3)  Some,  but  not  all,  of  the  above  group  will  be  included 
also  in  our  third  class :  the  very  lazy.    There  are  those  who  live 
an  almost  passive  existence;  who  can  scarcely  be  said  to  live: 
they  simply  exist;  some  one  has  suggested  that  they  only 
vegetate.     They  only  act  as  some  strong,  sensitive  experience 
thrills  them.     Perhaps  they  are  responsible  for  being  what 
they  are;  but  being  what  they  are,  and  as  they  are,  and  while 
they  are  as  they  are,  we  would  not  assail  them  on  the  amusement 
side  of  their  lives.     The  card  table,  the  circus,  and  the  dance 
may  have  important  functions  to  perform  for  them.     Such  is 
the  judgment  of  many  settlement  workers  in  our  slums;  men 
and  women  who  reach  after  a  class  of  humanity  lower  than 
General  Booth's  "submerged  tenth." 

(4)  Another  class  is  the  very  tired.     What  shall  we  do 
when  the  head  aches  and  the  brain  reels?    The  human  soul 
must  not  be  kept  continually  in  a  state  of  tension.     Such 
persons  must  have  a  change  of  action.     Amusement  of  some 
sort  may  be  useful  for  the  very  tired.     It  will  be  a  mistake, 
however,  for  such  persons  to  push  their  quest  for  diversion  to 
such  an  extreme  that  brain  and  nerve  are  as  tired  as  ever. 
With  them  the  purpose  in  amusement  is  rest  in  order  that 
earnest  work  may  be  resumed.     When  this  is  accomplished 
the  purposeless  activity  should  cease.     It  may  be  questioned 
whether  there  is  any  rest  to  either  participants  or  spectators 
in  the  strenuous  game  or  the  long  drawn  out  contest."    Our 
joyous  exuberance  at  the  close  of  such  an  event  is  not  so  good 
an  index  to  the  effect  of  the  supposed  recreation  as  the  lassitude 
of  the  next  morning.     Amusement  is  allowable  to  the  tired 
man,  but  let  him  see  to  it  that  he  does  not  vitiate  its  effect  by 
taking  it  in  intoxicating  doses.     This  danger  has  led    some 
earnest  people  to  question  whether  for  the  tired  worker   there 
are  not  things  other  than  those  usually  called  amusement, 
which  will  serve  the  purpose  of  recreation  better.     Some  have 
found  that  weariness  is  best  relieved  by  absolute  rest,  perfect 
relaxation.     Again  many  tired  men  and  women  have  found  it 


DUTIES  TO   SELF  149 

possible  to  provide  a  variety  in  useful  activities  and  where 
this  is  possible  it  is  certainly  ideal.  The  author  believes  that 
in  most  cases  it  is  possible  for  the  earnest  man.  Is  he  a  manual 
worker?  Intellectual  work  will  furnish  the  required  variety. 
Is  he  a  brain  worker?  It  is  generally  possible  to  find  some 
line  of  physical  effort,  useful  and  helpful  to  some  end,  which 
will  give  the, needed  relaxation.  The  author  wishes  to  give 
his  testimony  to  the  real  rest  and  help  that  he  has  been  able  to 
find  in  that  manner.  He  can  not  quite  understand  one  of  his 
friends,  a  preacher,  and  a  good  man,  who  could  find  no  rest 
from  his  study  in  an  hour  with  spade,  hoe,  or  lawn  mower,  but 
did  find  it  in  a  strenuous  game  of  tennis.  "Digging  in  the 
garden  is  work."  That  was  enough  to  spoil  it  for  him.  The 
example  of  Tolstoi  is  commended  to  you.  He  found  rest  from 
his  literary  labors  in  cobbling  the  shoes  of  the  Russian  peasantry. 
Though  a  critic  did  say,  "I  would  rather  read  his  novels  than 
wear  his  shoes." 

But  the  usefulness  of  amusement  of  some  sort  being  con- 
ceded for  a  given  person,  is  there  any  test  by  which  he  may 
determine  the  propriety  of  any  proposed  diversion?  There  is 
a  very  simple  one,  though  it  requires  some  ability  at  introspec- 
tion. The  man  with  high  ideals  will  feel  bound  to  reject  every 
form  of  amusement  in  which  the  thrill  of  pleasure  which  he 
experiences  arises  from  the  excitement  of  a  debased  passion. 
There  can  be  no  dissent  from  this  statement,  but  its  general 
application  would  revolutionize  some  circles  of  society.  What 
if  musicians  and  actors  all  at  once  concluded  that  nothing 
should  go  on  the  stage  which  tended  to  arouse  the  evil  pas- 
sions of  their  patrons.  How  the  moral  tone  of  those  professions 
would  be  elevated!  However,  it  would  probably  bankrupt 
the  whole  business  of  commercialized  amusement.  It  is 
impossible  to  resist  the  conviction  that  much  of  our  popular 
amusement  justifies  the  opinion  of  a  critic  who  said  that  it 
"seemed  to  have  been  invented  to  enable  men  to  enjoy  sin 
without  being  themselves  sinners."  So  confident  is  the  author 
of  the  correctness  and  sufficiency  of  the  test  above  indicated, 
that  for  people  who  have  come  to  years  of  discretion  he  would 


150  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

have  no  other  rule.  He  would  ask  each  one  to  settle  the 
matter  of  the  kind  of  diversion  he  shall  take  by  asking  this  one 
question:  "What  is  the  character  of  the  feeling  that  this 
particular  activity  develops  in  me?"  With  that  inquiry 
seriously  before  each  one  he  would  not  put  any  form  of  decent 
activity  on  the  blacklist.  It  is  certain  that  the  conscientious 
application  of  that  rule  would  make  a  marked  depletion  in  the 
ranks  of  our  Christian  pleasure  seekers. 

In  our  criticism  of  the  conventional  treatment  of  the  amuse- 
ment question  by  the  religious  moralists,  we  would  not  depreciate 
the  spirit  which  prompts  them  in  their  effort  to  shield  our 
youth  from  debasing  influences  in  their  hours  of  recreation. 
Especially  worthy  of  praise  are  those  who,  seeing  the  large 
number  of  persons  who  must  be  amused,  seek  to  lure  them  from 
the  evil  by  providing  entertainment  which  is  wholesome.  It 
takes  nothing  from  the  praise  which  is  their  due  that  much  of 
their  effort  is  foredoomed  to  failure.  In  seeking  to  win  the 
patronage  of  an  amusement  seeking  populace  they  are  at  a 
serious  disadvantage.  When  people  start  out  with  the  sole 
purpose  of  being  amused  they  will  choose  that  which  gives 
the  greater  thrill,  the  greater  variety  of  excitement.  Take 
out  of  much  of  our  entertainment  the  spice  of  vice  which  there 
is  in  it  and  it  has  lost  much  that  makes  it  popular. 

But  could  you  succeed  in  eliminating  from  our  popular 
amusements  all  that  is  pernicious,  could  we  subject  the  diver- 
sions of  our  people  to  the  judgment  of  the  wisest  censor,  we 
would  touch  only  superficially  the  evils  we  deplore.  Worse 
than  the  bad  effects  of  any  of  the  questionable  forms  of  diver- 
sion is  the  enthroning  of  the  amusement  seeking  impulse. 
Mingle  with  the  throng  of  pleasure  seekers  and  you  are  impressed 
with  this  thought:  "These  people  live  to  be  amused."  What- 
ever the  service  you  render  them  in  a  proper  censorship  of  their 
diversions,  you  "have  healed  the  hurt  of  the  daughter  of  my 
people  but  slightly"  until  their  eyes  are  opened  to  see  that  life 
is  more  than  a  thrill  or  a  laugh.  How  that  can  be  done  is  one 
of  the  weightiest  problems  for  those  who  say:  "For  the  hurt 


DUTIES   TO  SELF  151 

of  the  daughter  of  my  people  am  I  hurt."    And  truly  "who  is 
sufficient  for  these  things?" 

In  conclusion,  to  those  choice  spirits  whose  lives  are  inspired 
by  noble  purposes  and  high  resolves  —  for  your  consideration 
we  submit  this  problem:  "Required  the  place  for  amusement 
—sport — in  the  life  of  the  mature  man  who  craves  for  himself 
the  best  possible  in  character?"  Years  ago  that  question 
came  home  to  the  author  as  a  personal  one  and  to-day  it  stares 
him  in  the  face  unanswered.  He  does  not  say  that  no  answer 
is  possible.  He  holds  toward  it  an  attitude  of  open-mindedness. 
But  it  is  not  strange  that  after  these  years  of  thinking  and 
waiting  he  is  doubtful  about  rinding  an  answer.  With  each 
year  of  life  the  conviction  is  growing  that  in  the  scheme  of 
life  of  that  man  or  woman  who  craves  not  simply  the  good  but 
the  best  in  character  there  is  no  place  for  amusement  seeking. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
THE  DOCTRINE  OF  RIGHTS 

THIS  theme  might  be  treated  either  under  man's  duties  to 
himself  or  to  his  neighbor.  We  choose  to  place  it  between  the 
two.  In  this  discussion  we  do  not  use  the  term  rights  for  the 
claims  of  a  man  on  his  fellow  that  owe  their  existence  to  the 
law  of  the  State.  We  use  it  for  those  claims  which  men  would 
affirm  to  exist  prior  to  and  independent  of  such  law.  To  these 
the  name  natural  rights  has  been  given  by  some  writers.  The 
term  has  been  much  abused  yet  we  lack  a  better  word  with 
which  to  distinguish  from  law  created  rights  those  claims 
which  one  man  has  on  another  by  virtue  of  their  common 
manhood. 

The  origin  of  our  conception  of  rights  seems  something  like 
this:  I  am  conscious  of  certain  wants.  I  do  not  reason 
about  them  at  first,  I  simply  try  to  satisfy  them.  But  with 
growing  intelligence  as  I  form  an  idea  of  the  end  of  my  being 
under  the  category  of  design,  I  believe  that  some  provision  has 
been  made  whereby  I  may  satisfy  every  want  whose  satisfac- 
tion is  necessary  to  the  complete  life  as  I  conceive  it.  These 
things  I  claim  as  my  rights.  Further  I  find  myself  in  a  com- 
munity of  men  whose  capacities,  wants  and  feelings  are  in  a 
hundred  ways  like  my  own.  This  belief  has  a  corresponding 
feeling  known  in  Sociology  as  "The  Consciousness  of  Kind," 
which  is  of  great  service  in  Ethics.  It  is  a  fair  inference  by 
analogy,  that  those  who  resemble  me  in  so  many  ways  likewise 
resemble  me  in  having  claims  against  their  fellows,  to  be  allowed 
to  accomplish  the  end  of  their  being.  The  susceptibility  of 
men  to  training,  by  means  of  this  inference,  is  shown  by  the 
fact  that  everywhere  one  of  the  earliest  and  most  effective 
appeals  to  the  child's  moral  nature  is  made  in  the  question: 
"Now  how  would  you  like  to  be  treated  that  way?"  It  is  to 

152 


THE   DOCTRINE  OF   RIGHTS  153 

be  observed  that  A's  rights  with  respect  to  B  necessarily  imply 
duties  of  B  with  regard  to  A.  Thinking  of  them  only  as 
regards  A,  we  say  they  are  A's  rights,  but  if  B  is  considered  as 
obligated  to  voluntarily  concede  them,  we  say  they  are  B's 
duties  to  A.  We  propose  this  definition:  "Rights  are  those 
doings  and  forbearings  which  a  man  may  claim  of  his  fellow 
man,  and  may  enforce  by  an  appeal  to  his  consenting  con- 
science." A  French  philosopher  quoted  by  President  Porter 
says:  "Je  n'ai  1'idee  du  droit  d'autrui  que  parceque  je  con- 
nais  que  j'ai  moimeme  des  droits  que  parceque  je  connais  aupara- 
vant  que  j'ai  devoirs.  En  effet  je  concois  primitivement 
Pobligation  de  developper  mon  activite  selon  une  certaine 
loi,  de  tendre  vera  un  certain  but,  qui  est  le  bien  ou  la  perfection. 

"Cette  obligation  etant  absolue,  je  concois  en  meme  temps 
que  je  dois  disposer  de  tous  les  moynes  sans  lesquels  il  me 
serait  impossible  de  me  developper  conformement  a  la  loi. 
Ces  conditions  sont  essentiellement  celles  qui  constituent  ma 
personalites  savoir  ma  raison  et  ma  liberte;  c'est  la  mon  droit; 
et  ce  droit,  je  le  congois  une  consequence  necessaire  de  mon 
devoir. 

"Ce  que  j'appelle  mon  droit  c'est  done  en  definition  la 
possibilite  d'accomplir  mon  devoir,  et  de  me"me  la  possibility 
pour  mon  semblable  d'ac  complir  son  devoir  j'appelle  son 
droit." 

Duties  and  rights  being  thus  related,  the  question  may 
arise:  "What  is  the  duty  of  an  individual  regarding  the  mainte- 
nance of  his  rights,  as  against  those  who  owe  him  duties?"  To 
some  it  may  seem  that  such  discussion  would  be  superfluous, 
thinking  that  self  interest  in  human  nature  may  be  safely 
trusted  to  prompt  a  man  to  do  all  in  this  respect  that  he  ought 
to  do.  We  answer  not  safely  trusted.  Under  some  circum- 
stances self  interest  has  prompted  a  craven  submission  to 
injustice.  At  other  times  and  more  frequently  it  has  prompted 
a  pugnacious  and  ill  considered  overdoing.  Natural  impulses 
prompting  a  man  to  secure  his  own  rights  are  very  likely  to 
overlook  the  moral  claims  of  his  neighbor,  especially  if  those 
claims  are  of  a  character  for  which  his  neighbor  does  not  care. 


154  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

The  answer  to  our  question  is  often  complicated  by  the  fact 
that  while  my  neighbor  is  bound  to  concede  my  rights,  it  is 
possible  that  he  has  claims  upon  me  of  which  neither  of  us 
have  thought,  but  which  I  am  not  at  liberty  to  ignore  in  assert- 
ing my  own.  Let  it  be  remembered  that  the  assertion  of  a 
right  is  one  thing,  and  the  external  activity  employed  to  secure 
it  is  another.  With  that  word  of  caution  it  may  safely  be  said 
that  a  man  owes  it  both  to  himself  and  his  neighbor  to  assert 
his  rights.  We  do  not  say  how  he  shall  assert  them.  We  only 
say  that  it  should  be  done.  The  manner  of  the  doing  is  to  be 
determined  by  each  one  in  each  case,  as  a  reasonable  being 
wisely  suiting  means  to  ends.  It  is  an  injustice  to  my  neighbor, 
as  much  as  to  myself,  to  allow  him  to  trample  my  rights  under 
foot  without  protest.  Nor  is  it  most  important  that  I  force 
a  concession  from  him.  I  must  in  some  way  appeal  to  his 
consenting  conscience. 

Very  diverse  have  been  the  means  employed  by  good  men 
in  the  maintenance  of  their  rights.  Sometimes  it  has  been 
the  stinging  blow  and  the  sharp  retort.  At  other  times  the 
end  has  been  accomplished  (though  here  is  a  hard  lesson  to 
learn)  by  the  spirit  that  "answereth  not  again"  and  which 
will  ugo  twain"  with  him  who  "will  compel  thee  to  go  a  mile." 
It  is  a  grievous  error  to  see  nothing  beyond  the  immediate 
possession  of  that  which  it  is  my  right  to  have.  To  illustrate: 
let  us  suppose  that  you  owe  me  five  dollars.  You  have  it  and 
ought  to  pay  it  now,  but  refuse.  It  is  my  duty  to  assert  my 
right,  but,  in  my  scheme  of  assertion,  nine  times  out  of  ten  I 
think  only  of  the  shortest  and  quickest  transfer  of  that  five 
dollars  from  your  pocket  to  mine;  and  whatever  the  means  I 
employ,  if  I  succeed,  society  will  applaud  me  and  I  will  con- 
gratulate myself  on  being  a  courageous  and  high  spirited  man. 
But  in  any  scheme  of  assertion  that  I  adopt  it  is  even  more 
important  to  you  that  you  shall  voluntarily  and  freely  concede 
my  claim  and  hand  out  the  five  dollars  than  it  is  to  me  that  I 
shall  receive  my  own.  I  had  better  assert  my  right  to-day,  and 
if  need  be  wait  ten  years  for  my  money,  if  at  the  close  of  that 
time  I  can  have  it  freely  conceded  by  you,  than  to  wrest  the 


THE   DOCTRINE  OF   RIGHTS  155 

five  dollars  from  you  now  by  force,  trickery  or  law,  and  leave 
you  feeling  (however  erroneously)  that  you  have  been  wronged 
by  me. 

Each  one  must  determine,  and  that  at  his  own  risk,  how  he 
will  assert  his  rights.  We  only  claim  two  things:  i.  He 
must  assert  them.  2.  Any  special  scheme  of  assertion  which 
he  may  adopt  must  take  into  account,  not  alone  the  possibility 
of  securing  possession  of  that  which  is  his  own,  but  also  the 
effect  to  be  produced  upon  the  character  of  his  neighbor  who 
for  the  time  is  withholding  his  right. 

We  will  consider  in  order  a  man's  right  to  life,  liberty, 
property  and  reputation,  (i)  The  right  to  life.  Corre- 
sponding to  a  man's  right  to  live  is  his  duty  to  let  his  neighbor 
live.  We  have  heard  of  certain  inalienable  rights,  among 
which  are  life,  liberty  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  A  criticism 
has  been  made  on  the  use  of  the  word  "inalienable";  there 
are  no  such  rights  as  the  etymology  of  that  word  would  indicate. 
Its  use  by  the  framers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  was 
a  rhetorical  device  to  express  the  very  sacred  character  of 
those  rights  to  secure  which  "governments  are  instituted 
among  men."  Their  enumeration  of  the  right  to  life  first 
among  them,  accords  with  the  high  place  assigned  to  this  right 
among  statesmen  and  philosophers  generally.  Co-extensive 
with  a  man's  right  to  live  is  the  duty  of  his  neighbor  to  let 
him  live.  This  does  not  affirm  the  right  to  live  in  any  particular 
manner,  or  at  the  expense  of  another  individual,  nor  of  society. 
The  saying  that  the  world  owes  me  a  living  is  one  of  ambiguous 
import,  especially  when  coupled  with  the  further  declaration 
"and  I  intend  to  have  it."  If  the  speaker  mean  that  his 
being  in  the  world  is  evidence  that  the  Creator  intended  that 
he  should  live  in  it,  and  has  somewhere  made  provision  for  his 
living,  and  that  he  proposes  to  find  where,  out  of  the  provision 
which  nature  has  made,  he  may  obtain  the  things  wherewith  to 
live,  the  utterance  becomes  an  expression  of  devout  faith,  and 
of  manly  self  reliance.  But  as  we  usually  hear  it,  it  seems  to 
mean  that  society  owes  me  a  living  and  if  my  fellow  men  do 
not  keep  me  as  I  wish  to  be  kept  I  propose  to  make  trouble  for 


156  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

society.  With  that  interpretation  we  dispute  the  saying. 
Society  owes  me  a  living?  What  have  I,  the  average  young 
man  of  twenty  years,  done  to  put  society  under  obligation  to 
me?  Society,  represented  by  my  relatives,  gave  me  a  living 
freely  when  I  was  a  kicking,  squalling  baby,  and  in  return  for 
that  living  I  gave  nothing,  was  capable  of  giving  nothing  but 
vexation  and  annoyance.  Even  in  my  youth  and  young  man- 
hood it  is  doubtful  whether  I  have  done  anything  for  which  I 
have  not  already  received  a  full  equivalent.  The  world  owes 
me  a  living?  Wherefore?  If  in  the  past  I  have  held  such  a 
conceit,  let  me  now  abandon  it.  In  all  probability  the  debt 
is  the  other  way.  The  world  does  not  owe  any  man  a  living 
until  he  has  earned  it  quid  pro  quo. 

But  there  is  one  demand  I  may  make  of  my  fellow  man, 
either  as  an  individual  or  in  society,  and  I  can  enforce  the 
demand  by  an  appeal  to  his  consenting  conscience:  I  may 
claim  that  he  allow  me  to  live:  that  he  shall  abstain  from  doing 
those  things  which  will  render  my  living  more  difficult.  I  may 
rightfully  complain  if  those  who  have  lived  before  me  have 
destroyed  all  the  fish  of  the  waters  or  the  game  of  the  jungle; 
if  they  have  wantonly  felled  the  forest  or  exhausted  the  fertility 
of  the  soil.  And  I  may  complain  of  society  if  it  has  allowed  a 
few  of  its  favored  members  to  hold  for  their  simple  pleasure  or 
exclusive  profit  all  the  desirable  portion  of  the  surface  of  the 
earth  so  that  I  can  find  neither  standing  room,  nor  a  place  to 
raise  potatoes. 

While  the  right  to  live  does  not  imply  any  particular  scale 
of  convenience,  or  luxury,  it  does  mean  more  than  the  simple 
possibility  of  existence.  I  may  claim  of  my  neighbor,  and 
enforce  by  an  appeal  to  his  consenting  conscience,  that  he 
shall  not,  by  any  system  of  caste  or  class  distinction,  throw 
any  obstacle  in  the  way  of  my  attainment  in  the  development 
of  my  faculties,  of  the  largest  life  possible  to  me. 

(2)  Another  right  is  the  free  and  unhindered  possession 
and  control  of  my  own  body.  This  is  known  as  personal 
liberty.  The  same  limitations  apply  here  as  elsewhere.  It  is 
not  liberty  in  the  control  of  my  body  to  deprive  my  neighbor 


THE  DOCTRINE  OF  RIGHTS  157 

of  the  like  privilege.  My  right  to  swing  my  arms  must  stop 
short  of  my  neighbor's  nose.  Under  the  limitations  common 
to  the  exercise  of  all  rights  belonging  to  man  in  society,  we 
maintain  that  this  is  one  of  the  most  sacred  of  human  rights. 
We  admire  the  Scottish  chieftain  who 

....  round  him  drew  his  cloak. 
Folded  his  arms  and  thus  he  spoke, 
"My  manor's  halls  and  bowers  shall  still 
Be  open  at  my  sovereign's  will; 
To  each  one  whom  he  lists  how  e'er 
Unmeet  to  be  the  owner's  peer. 
My  castles  are  my  king's  alone 
From  turret  to  foundation  stone; 
The  hand  of  Douglass  is  his  own." 

The  civilization  of  the  world  has  so  advanced  that  few  if 
any  will  advocate  the  custom  of  enslaving  men,  which  is  simply 
the  process  of  depriving  one's  fellow  man  of  the  right  to  control 
his  own  body.  But  there  remains  in  the  ignoring  the  right,  or 
in  wanton  trespass  upon  it,  an  amount  of  cruelty  of  which 
perhaps  some  have  thought  but  little.  If  the  story  of  the  street 
and  playground,  in  almost  any  of  our  towns,  were  told  in  full 
for  but  a  single  day  there  would  be  startling  revelations  of 
tyranny.  There  seems  to  be  a  time  in  the  development  of 
many  a  male  specimen  of  the  human  animal,  usually  about  the 
time  he  becomes  aware  that  he  has  outgrown  the  liability  to 
parental  chastisement,  when  it  is  esteemed  the  special  privilege 
of  his  station  to  assault  and  tease  and  bully,  to  slap  and  kick 
and  cuff  the  little  fellow  who  gets  in  his  way.  And  unless  he 
sheds  blood  or  breaks  bones  he  is  indignant  that  any  one 
should  accuse  him  of  wrong  doing.  He  seems  entirely  unaware 
of  the  violence  done  to  the  self  respect  of  his  victim  in  the 
invasion  of  a  sacred  right  which  he  was  powerless  to  defend. 
Teachers  of  public  schools  need  to  look  out  for  it.  There  are 
some  youths  who  have  not  outgrown  this  period  at  the  time 
they  enter  college,  and  the  same  spirit  manifests  itself  in  the 
instances  of  hazing  which  in  the  past  have  disgraced  so  many 
of  our  larger  institutions  of  learning.  Nor  are  older  people 
free  from  blame  in  this  respect.  Nothing  is  more  common  than 


1 58  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

for  the  visitor  in  a  home  to  select  a  bright  little  one,  pull  his 
hair,  twitch  his  ears,  or  punch  his  ribs  "just  for  fun."  It  is 
time  some  one  should  speak  in  defense  of  outraged  childhood. 
The  conduct  is  no  less  cruel  because  it  is  free  from  malice. 
The  right  of  the  child  to  the  use  of  his  own  body  is  as  sacred 
as  that  of  the  adult.  We  restrain  the  personal  liberty  of  the 
adult  when  necessary  for  his  own  protection  or  that  of  another 
and  only  a  like  necessity  will  justify  the  like  interference  with 
the  same  right  of  the  child. 

(3)  We  next  consider  the  right  of  holding  property.  We 
use  the  word  property,  not  in  its  technical  and  legal  sense,  but 
in  the  common  acceptation  of  the  term — as  a  collective  word 
to  designate  material  goods.  By  his  nature  man  is  fitted  to 
own  property.  He  has  a  natural  craving  which  finds  satis- 
faction in  proprietorship.  The  writer  knew  two  children 
who  resembled  each  other  so  completely  that  only  their  most 
intimate  friends  could  distinguish  one  from  the  other.  Their 
parents  treated  them  alike.  The  toys  and  clothes  procured 
for  them  were  just  as  much  alike  as  possible.  And  yet  those 
children  on  receiving  gifts  apparently  indistinguishable  would 
look  up  some  distinction  whereby  one  might  be  known  from 
the  other.  When  Jennie  sits  down  in  Nettie's  chair,  there  is 
no  reason  why  Nettie  might  not  with  equal  comfort  sit  in 
Jennie's.  But  she  wants  her  own  and  claims  it  with  such 
vehemence  that  mother  is  brought  on  the  scene,  when  she 
triumphantly  exhibits  a  little  knot  about  the  size  of  a  dime  in 
the  upturned  bottom  of  the  chair  by  which  they  had"  agreed 
that  one  should  be  known  from  the  other.  What  was  this  but 
the  instinct  for  proprietorship  revealing  itself,  increased  we 
admit  by  a  considerable  amount  of  infantile  perversity.  The 
use  of  this  propensity  in  the  human  constitution  is  to  enable 
man  to  provide  for  the  satisfaction  of  his  wants  beyond  the 
immediate  present.  Something  analogous  to  it  and  serving  a 
similar  purpose  is  found  in  the  hoarding  impulses  of  some  of 
the  lower  orders.  Like  all  other  impulses  which  are  common  to 
man  and  the  brute  this  craving  is  to  be  subjected  to  rational 
control,  and  exercised  in  conformity  with  the  purpose  for  which 


THE   DOCTRINE  OF   RIGHTS  159 

it  is  given.  It  should  be  exercised  under  such  limitations  that 
the  like  right  of  one's  neighbor  may  have  equal  recognition. 
Of  such  restraints  and  limitations  men  are  impatient.  Carlisle 
says  that  "all  the  upholsterers  and  confectioners  in  Europe 
could  not  make  one  shoeblack  happy  for  more  than  an  hour  or 
two.  Try  him  with  one-half  of  God's  universe  and  forthwith  he 
sets  to  quarreling  with  the  proprietor  of  the  other  half  and 
declares  himself  the  most  maltreated  of  men."  This  would 
only  show  the  discontent  and  dishonesty  of  the  shoeblack. 
We  affirm  of  him  that  he  is  capable,  with  much  smaller  pos- 
session than  that  supposed,  of  exhibiting  a  considerable  degree 
of  contentment;  of  distinguishing  "mine  and  thine,"  and  of 
learning  to  respect  you  in  the  one  even  as  he  defends  himself 
in  the  other.  This  craving  of  men  for  material  possessions  has 
been  the  occasion  of  the  making  and  administration  of  a  large 
portion  of  the  civil  law.  From  this  some  have  said  that  the 
right  of  private  property  is  created  by  the  civil  law.  The 
statement,  though  true  of  the  civil  right,  is  incorrect  as  to 
the  moral  claim.  These  two  things  should  be  clearly  distin- 
guished from  each  other.  The  civil  law  in  theory  seeks  to 
ascertain  the  moral  claim,  and  to  define  the  civil  right  of  holding 
property  in  accordance  therewith,  but  the  moral  claim  it 
does  not  and  cannot  create.  If  the  right  does  not  exist  prior  to 
the  act  of  the  lawmaker,  it  is  doubtful  whether  it  has  any 
foundation  in  justice  afterwards.  Law  may  declare  what  the 
right  is  in  any  particular,  but  the  right  itself  it  cannot  create. 
Unless  the  fish  I  have  caught  or  the  grain  I  have  raised  is 
already  mine  in  a  sense  that  it  is  not  my  neighbor's,  the  lawmaker 
is  guilty  of  robbery  in  protecting  me  in  its  exclusive  enjoyment. 
Most  men  will  agree  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  lawmaker  to 
ascertain  as  nearly  as  he  can  that  which  is  just  and  make  his 
deliverances  accordingly.  In  the  degree  to  which  he  may  be 
able  to  realize  this  ideal  will  he  merit  the  favorable  judgment 
of  posterity. 

The  ethical  basis  of  ownership  is  human  effort  expended  on 
natural  agents.  The  labor  leaders  are  right  in  their  principle, 
though  sometimes  in  error  in  its  application,  when  they  affirm 


160  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

that  each  man  is  entitled  to  that  which  his  labor  produces. 
In  primitive  society,  while  natural  agents  were  abundant  and 
free,  and  industry  was  individualistic,  the  application  of  our 
principle  would  seem  to  have  been  a  simple  matter.  But  in 
the  complex  adjustments  and  mal-adjustments  of  our  modern 
industrial  life  the  practical  difficulty  is  to  ascertain  just  what 
each  one  by  toil  of  hand  or  brain  has  produced.  The  system 
of  free  (?)  contract  has  superseded  everything  else  in  industry. 
A  man  receives  what  he  has  agreed  to  render  service  for. 
Unhappily  few  men  when  making  bargains  think  of  the  equitable 
principle  we  have  announced.  The  man  who  wants  more 
than  he  earns  is  dishonest  as  sin.  Yet  few  men  in  the  market 
are  content  with  what  they  contribute  to  production.  The 
practical  outcome  is  that  the  rewards  of  industry  are  won  by 
skill  in  bargaining  rather  than  by  efficiency  in  producing. 
Few  will  contend  that  the  present  distribution  of  the  increment 
of  industry  is  at  all  equitable.  But  little  attention  is  given  to 
our  principle  of  equitable  ownership,  and  many  will  insist  that 
it  is  impossible  of  application.  Nevertheless  we  believe  it  the 
proper  thing  to  teach,  and  that  the  adjustments  of  the  future 
will  not  be  as  far  from  equity  if  we  keep  this  principle  in  mind 
as  they  will  be  if  we  throw  equity  to  the  winds. 


CHAPTER  IX 
THE  DOCTRINE  OF  RIGHTS  —  CONTINUED 

IN  asserting  most  confidently  a  man's  moral  right  to  be  allowed 
to  acquire  and  hold  property  we  have  said  nothing  of  the 
extent  of  the  holding,  and  but  little  of  the  manner  of  the  acquisi- 
tion. Of  course  there  are  limitations  to  the  moral  claim  to 
property,  and  the  legislator  will  take  knowledge  of  the  fact, 
but  at  best  his  work  is  likely  to  be  but  an  approximation  to 
justice.  We  have  left  behind  us  that  law  of  the  human  jungle : 
"Let  him  take  who  can,  and  let  him  keep  who  is  able."  The 
civil  law  will  not  recognize  any  right  to  things  wrested  from 
another  by  superior  physical  force,  but  as  we  have  seen  it  does 
protect  a  man  in  the  possession  of  property  secured  by  extra 
skill  in  bargaining.  Not  because  the  moral  claim  is  one  whit 
better  in  one  case  than  in  the  other,  but  because  of  the  difficulty 
of  finding  and  enforcing  appropriate  legislation.  It  has  usually 
been  taken  for  granted  that  a  man's  right  to  acquire  immense 
wealth  was  unlimited  —  that  there  was  no  evil  in  simple 
bigness  of  possession.  There  may  not  be  or  there  may  be.  There 
is  significance  in  the  phrase  coined  some  years  since,  "  predatory 
wealth."  When  the  simple  bigness  of  one  man's  possession 
interferes  with  the  possibility  of  another  man  acquiring  a 
little,  it  becomes  predatory  and  the  man  has  no  moral  claim 
to  it  however  difficult  it  may  be  to  frame  a  law  to  fit  the  case. 
If  the  law  protects  a  man  in  the  making  and  holding  more  than 
his  living,  he  has  a  duty  to  make  his  possession  a  social  benefit. 
Some  years  since  a  great  economist  said:  "If  men  of  wealth 
do  not  learn  to  use  their  property  for  the  benefit  of  society, 
the  time  will  come  that  society  will  own  it  for  them."  Similar 
statements  brought  the  man  into  trouble,  and  we  are  sorry  that 
we  have  not  been  able  to  find  that  sentence  in  the  later 
editions  of  his  works. 

161 


162  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

We  should  be  open  minded  as  to  measures  of  social  and 
economic  reform,  ready  to  approve  them  when  they  commend 
themselves  to  us  as  just.  We  must  not  be  so  pessimistic  as 
to  conclude  that  because  no  remedy  for  an  evil  is  in  sight, 
therefore  none  will  ever  be  found. 

There  are  two  time  honored  institutions  which  have  con- 
tributed much  to  the  development  of  civilization,  yet  out  of 
which  great  evils  have  arisen.  At  present  there  is  no  scheme 
of  reform  which  we  can  unreservedly  commend,  but  as  sure  as 
there  is  one  "who  will  reprove  with  equity  for  the  meek  of 
the  earth"  a  remedy  will  be  found  for  these  abuses.  We  name 
(a)  The  unlimited  private  ownership  of  land  with  its  unearned 
increment.  One  of  the  most  fundamental  of  human  neces- 
sities is  the  right  of  access  to  natural  agents,  the  right  to  take 
fish  from  the  water,  game  from  the  jungle  and  to  raise  food 
from  the  soil.  •  To  be  allowed  so  to  do  is  a  moral  claim.  You 
can  enforce  it  by  an  appeal  to  the  consenting  conscience  of 
your  fellow  man.  It  is  so  reasonable  and  apparent  that  he 
can  no  more  dispute  it  than  he  can  deny  your  right  to  breathe 
the  air  of  heaven.  But  grant  this  right  in  the  abstract  and 
still  you  have  said  nothing  as  to  the  particular  portion  of  the 
soil  which  one  may  till.  Since  two  persons  cannot  occupy  the 
same  portion,  a  partition  into  plots  is  a  reasonable  and  necessary 
procedure.  Experience  shows  permanence  of  tenure  to  be 
conducive  to  the  highest  productiveness.  In  both  the  James- 
town and  the  Plymouth  colony,  collective  ownership  was 
tried  and  early  abandoned.  We  may  reasonably  suppose 
that  private  ownership  of  land  arose  in  like  manner  in  every 
civilized  state.  No  one  appears  wronged.  Did  one  man  want 
another's  plot?  Any  one  of  fifty  equally  good  ones  were  to  be 
had  for  the  taking.  A  hundred  years  pass.  The  wilderness  in 
the  immediate  vicinity  has  all  been  appropriated.  What  of 
it?  "Go  west,  young  man,  and  grow  up  with  the  country." 
Another  century  passes  and  there  is  no  longer  any  west  to 
go  to.  Now  the  young  man  must  buy  a  farm  near  the  ances- 
tral home.  But  there  he  strikes  a  difficulty.  The  land  has 
risen  in  value.  It  will  require  the  toil  of  a  lifetime  to  purchase 


THE   DOCTRINE  OF   RIGHTS  163 

the  foothold  on  the  soil  which  his  grandfather  received  for  the 
asking.  The  neighborhood  may  be  a  more  pleasant  place  to 
live  in  (or  it  may  not)  but  as  an  agent  of  production  the  land 
is  no  better  now  than  it  was  then.  We  are  all  familiar  with 
cases  where  fortunes  have  been  made  in  the  rise  in  land  values 
without  the  owners  turning  a  hand  to  increase  the  utility  of 
their  holdings.  Stand  up  and  answer  me  ye  who  "join  house 
to  house  and  lay  field  to  field  till  there  be  no  place  —  in  the 
midst  of  the  earth."  By  whose  authority  do  the  men  of  one 
generation  cut  off  one-half  of  the  men  of  the  next  generation 
from  their  heritage  in  God  Almighty's  fertile  soil?  Land 
owners  hold  the  legal  title  to  their  lands.  The  law  gives  them 
the  civil  right  to  all  the  increase  in  their  value;  but  have  they 
any  moral  claim  to  any  but  a  small  part  of  it?  Each  of  a 
thousand  men  in  the  neighborhood  has  contributed  to  the  worth 
of  that  land  as  much  as  has  the  owner.  Society  allows  those 
who  hold  the  title  to  keep  it  all,  because  no  one  knows  how 
to  distribute  that  increment.  Meanwhile  the  children  of  the 
laborer  find  no  rest  for  the  soles  of  their  feet.  There  is  no 
soil  from  which  they  may  raise  their  food.  They  can  live 
only  by  selling  their  labor  in  the  market,  (b)  And  here  we 
strike  our  second  time-honored  institution  —  The  Right  of 
Private  Contract.  The  young  man  cut  off  from  access  to  the 
soil  offers  himself  to  work  for  wages;  sometimes  successfully; 
again  he  stands  not  only  all  the  day,  but  many  days  idle 
"because  no  man  hath  hired  him."  No  man  is  compelled  to 
hire  him  and  nothing  but  infinite  wisdom  could  find  the  man 
who  ought  to  hire  him.  But  depend  upon  it;  a  system  under 
which  he  is  denied  the  right  to  an  acre  of  land  on  which  to  "  raise 
his  potatoes"  cannot  endure  forever.  There  was  deep  philos- 
ophy in  the  saying  of  the  labor  leader  (however  wrong  and 
brutal  his  application  of  it)  when  he  declared  that  "every  man 
has  a  right  to  his  job."  So  we  say,  however  hoary  with  age, 
however  revered  by  the  sage,  this  right  of  private  contract  may 
be,  every  man  willing  to  work  has  a  moral  claim  on  his  fellow 
man  in  society  to  be  allowed  somewhere,  something  to  do. 
He  has  a  right  to  a  job,  and  society  must  help  him  to  find  it. 


164  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

(4)  One  more  right  remains  to  be  considered.  A  man 
has  a  right  to  be  allowed  to  enjoy  the  good  name  which  he  has 
honestly  won  for  himself  among  his  fellows.  He  has  a  right 
to  his  reputation.  There  are  cases,  and  many  of  them,  where 
this  has  a  worth  which  can  be  measured  in  money.  But  aside 
from  all  considerations  of  that  character,  the  approbation  of 
one's  friends  and  the  respect  of  his  neighbors  is  itself  a  good  of 
a  high  order.  We  do  not  say  that  it  is  the  highest.  A  man's 
character  is  what  he  is,  his  reputation  is  only  what  his  neighbors 
think  he  is.  As  a  good  it  must  be  ranked  lower  than  the 
other  but  is  not  to  be  despised.  We  shall  say  more  of  it  in 
another  place;  here  we  only  call  attention  to  the  existence  of 
the  right  of  one  to  his  reputation,  and  to  the  importance  of 
treating  his  own  good  name  with  proper  consideration.  It  is 
one  error  to  so  overestimate  reputation  that  one  will  sacrifice 
character  to  preserve  it,  another  is  to  esteem  it  of  small  account. 
When  we  hear  young  people  say:  "I  don't  care  what  people 
think  of  me,"  we  hope  they  are  not  speaking  truthfully.  Bad 
as  is  the  falsehood,  they  may  repent  of  it  and  redeem  them- 
selves. But  if  it  is  really  true,  there  is  revealed  a  depth  of 
perversity,  such  that  it  is  doubtful  whether  any  reforming 
agency  can  find  anything  in  them  to  work  upon.  We  have 
known  some  young  men  (and  we  regret  to  say  young  women 
also)  who  took  delight  in  trampling  under  foot  those  con- 
ventionalities of  society  which  are  supposed  to  be  signs  of 
good  morals  and  correct  taste.  In  another  place  we  will 
speak  of  the  duty  of  putting  the  best  possible  construction  on 
the  conduct  of  our  fellows,  but  one  lives  in  the  gaze  of  many 
who  will  not  always  be  so  considerate.  We  are  considering 
here  a  man's  right  to  his  good  name,  and  would  warn  young 
people  that  it  is  a  great  injustice  to  themselves  to  so  act  as 
to  forfeit  it.  A  man  who  is  at  heart  and  by  training  a  gentle- 
man should  remember  that  his  fellow  men  have  nothing  but 
his  conduct  by  which  to  judge  his  character.  He  does  himself 
a  great  injustice  when  he  acts  like  a  "rowdy."  If  he  does  so 
there  is  no  one  but  himself  to  blame  when  his  neighbors  think 
him  one  and  treat  him  accordingly. 


CHAPTER  X 
DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS  FELLOW  MAN 

IT  has  been  held  by  moralists  generally  that  all  the  duties 
which  a  man  owes  to  his  fellow  man  are  comprehended  in  one 
word:  benevolence.  This  is  true  if  we  remember  that  benevo- 
lence has  an  active  significance.  To  understand  the  word  as 
simply  well-wishing  and  then  attempt  to  include  in  it  all  our 
duties  to  our  fellows  would  be  to  relieve  men  of  a  large  part 
of  their  obligations.  It  would  justify  the  priest  and  the  Levite 
in  beholding  the  wounded  man  and  passing  by  on  the  other 
side.  It  would  allow  me  to  feed  the  hungry  and  clothe  the 
naked  by  simply  saying  "Be  thou  warmed,"  or  "be  thou  fed." 
We  have  observed  heretofore  that  little  credit  can  be  given  for 
correct  feeling  unless  it  issues  in  appropriate  willing  and  doing. 
No  objection  can  be  made  to  considering  benevolence  the  sum 
of  this  division  of  human  duties  if  we  translate  the  word  benevo- 
lence, good-willing  instead  of  good-wishing.  This  will  imply 
that  we  not  only  in  a  general  way  wish  good  for  our  .neighbor 
but  that  we  energetically  will  it  for  him.  And  what  is  the 
good  that  I  shall  will — choose  —  for  my  neighbor?  The  answer 
is  found  in  our  common  nature.  Whatever  would  be  good  for 
me  (not  always  what  I  might  wish)  will  be  good  for  him.  There 
was  profound  philosophy  in  the  saying  of  Jesus:  "Whatsoever 
ye  would  that  men  should  do  unto  you,  do  ye  even  so  unto 
them."  The  rule  however  is  often  misquoted,  for  example: 
"Do  to  every  man  that  which  if  you  were  he  and  in  his  place 
you  would  wish  done  to  you."  Well  if  I  were  he  and  in  his 
place  my  wishes  would  be  just  what  his  are;  so  we  have  the 
rule  reduced  to  the  senseless  direction:  do  to  every  man  just 
what  he  wishes  you  to  do.  But  the  maxim  is  not  do  what 
ye  would  wish,  but  what  ye  would  that  men  should  do  unto 
you.  The  standpoint  of  condition  is  indeed  that  of  my  neigh- 

165 


166  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

bor;  the  standpoint  of  judgment  is  my  own  present  intelligent 
perception  of  that  which  would  be  good  for  me  in  that  condition. 
The  reasonableness  of  this  interpretation  may  be  seen  by 
testing  it  in  two  cases  in  which  the  golden  rule  has  been  declared 
inapplicable.  I  am  passing  your  house  and  see  a  burglar  who 
has  entered  in  your  absence,  packed  your  valuables  in  his 
suit  case  and  is  leaving  with  his  plunder.  I  am  about  to  call 
the  police,  when  I  remember  the  golden  rule.  No  question 
about  it,  were  I  that  thief  and  in  his  place  and  he  in  mine,  I 
would  wish  him  to  give  me  time  to  make  my  escape  before 
giving  the  alarm.  Moral  teachers  generally  reply  that  cer- 
tainly you,  the  owner  of  the  house,  are  as  much  entitled  to 
consideration  as  the  thief,  and  that  if  I  were  the  owner  of  the 
house  and  in  his  place  I  would  wish  the  thief  arrested  and  my 
property  restored.  This  is  a  good  example  of  common  sense 
asserting  itself  in  the  interest  of  good  morals  against  theoretic 
moralizing.  Our  golden  rule,  however,  with  such  an  interpre- 
tation is  found  to  be  no  rule  at  all  in  practical  affairs.  I  want 
a  rule  that  will  take  in  my  duty  to  the  thief  as  well  as  to  the 
owner  of  the  house.  Take  another  example:  See  that  lunatic 
struggling  with  his  guard,  being  borne  away  to  the  asylum. 
We  all  know  what  he  wishes;  and  were  I  insane  and  in  his 
place  I  would  wish  just  as  he  does.  Shall  I  treat  him  accord- 
ingly? Not  at  all.  Has  our  golden  rule  then  any  application? 
Most  certainly.  How  do  we  interpret  it?  Thus:  As  a  sane 
man  now  I  am  capable  of  choosing  the  kind  of  treatment  — 
that  which  from  my  present  standpoint  of  sane  judgment,  I 
would  that  men  should  give  to  me  were  I  in  that  sad  condition. 
We  believe  this  to  be  the  true  and  consistent  interpretation 
of  the  rule.  It  is  sane  and  safe,  accords  with  a  sound  philosophy 
and  leaves  no  accommodation  necessary  to  make  our  golden 
rule  universal  in  its  application. 

We  said  that  there  is  an  active  and  a  passive  benevolence. 
One  consists  in  doing  no  harm,  the  other  in  doing  all  possible 
good.  Passive  benevolence  relates  chiefly  to  my  regard  for 
my  neighbor's  rights  and  may  be  treated  under  two  heads: 
justice  and  veracity.  Active  benevolence,  appropriately  termed 


DUTIES   OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS   FELLOW  MAN  167 

beneficence  or  good  doing,  will  vary  in  content;  to-day  it  tears 
a  thief  away  from  his  home  and  shuts  him  up  in  prison;  to-morrow 
it  feeds  and  clothes  his  family.  Some  have  objected  to  having 
what  thus  seems  a  variable  code  and  would  insist  that  only  a 
list  of  activities  always  pleasant  to  the  recipient  should  be 
called  beneficent.  Perhaps  such  a  code  might  be  possible  for 
angels;  among  men  it  would  work  as  much  evil  as  good.  Kant 
affirmed  that  there  is  nothing  universally  good  but  the  good 
will.  The  good  will  is  the  constant  in  the  moral  equation  of 
human  life. 

We  begin  our  discussion  of  the  specific  duties  man  owes  his 
fellow  with  justice.  There  is  reason  in  the  even  balance 
representing  justice  in  so  many  countries  and  through  so 
many  ages.  It  implies  equality  of  right  and  duties,  that 
whatever  rights  I  claim  for  myself  I  concede  freely  to  another. 
Justice  may  have  respect  to  my  neighbor's  body,  his  property 
or  his  reputation.  As  we  have  seen,  his  rights  lie  in  these  three 
fields.  But  little  further  need  be  said  of  justice  as  regards  the 
body  of  one's  neighbor.  With  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  all 
civilized  countries  there  is  one  chapter  in  moral  science  that 
is  well  nigh  obsolete.  And  yet  it  is  claimed  that  some  large 
employers  to-day  deliberately  plan  to  keep  their  employees 
face  to  face  with  immediate  want  that  they  more  easily  may 
command  their  services.  If  this  be  done  it  is  a  gross  injustice 
of  the  same  moral  turpitude  as  the  institution  of  slavery. 

Justice  as  regards  his  neighbor's  property  is  known  as 
honesty.  It  is  no  small  thing  to  be  a  strictly  honest  man. 
Absolute  honesty  essays  to  keep  every  promise,  gives  sixteen 
ounces  to  the  pound,  thirty-six  inches  to  the  yard,  and  pays 
one  hundred  cents  on  the  dollar.  The  essence  of  all  dishonesty 
is  in  the  attempt  to  get  something  for  nothing.  It  matters 
not  at  all  whether  this  attempt  is  made  by  "the  deceitful 
balances,"  or  by  false  representations  of  goods,  by  passing 
counterfeit  coin,  by  shuffling  the  cards  or  by  cornering  the 
market,  it  is  all  the  same.  Whoever  wishes  a  good  from  his 
fellow  without  rendering  an  equal  one  in  return  is  not  honest 
at  heart.  Some  one  has  truly  said  that  unequal  is  the  equivalent 


i68  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

of  inequity  and  inequity  equals  iniquity.  In  this  connection 
we  would  quote  Professor  Wright  of  the  Iowa  Teachers  College 
who  says:  "Graft  is  the  process  of  getting  something  for 
nothing  by  conventionally  respectable  methods." 

It  is  perhaps  more  difficult  to  do  justice  to  my  neighbor  as 
regards  his  reputation  than  with  respect  to  his  earthly  posses- 
sions. In  general  it  may  be  said  that  justice  will  require  that 
I  shall  be  careful  to  form  of  him  as  favorable  an  opinion  as  his 
conduct  will  warrant.  He  has  no  right  to  claim,  like  a  certain 
character  in  fiction,  "Think  of  me  only  at  my  best,"  but  he  has 
a  right  to  say  like  Cromwell  "paint  me  as  I  am."  It  may  be 
well  for  us  to  remember  that  probably  not  more  than  one-half 
of  our  estimate  of  the  character  of  our  fellows  is  made  on  the 
basis  of  their  conduct.  The  other  half  grows  out  of  our  personal 
likes  and  dislikes  —  in  short,  out  of  what  has  been  called  our 
"constitutional  prejudices." 

Further  it  is  only  justice  that  I  leave  my  neighbor  to  enjoy 
the  good  name  among  men  which  he  has  been  able  to  secure. 
I  know  only  one  exception  to  the  rule:  that  is  where  exposure 
is  necessary  to  protect  innocent  parties  from  the  effect  of  mis- 
placed confidence.  Large  numbers  of  people  are  very  careless 
about  their  treatment  of  this  right.  He  who  would  not  for  his 
right  arm  cheat  even  his  enemy  out  of  a  cent  feels  that  to 
damage,  by  the  curl  of  the  lip,  by  covert  insinuation  or  the 
word  of  contempt,  the  good  repute  of  the  object  of  his  dislike, 
if  it  can  be  done  by  any  means  except  downright  falsehood,  is  a 
legitimate  procedure.  Compared  with  such  conduct  the 
Indian  who  burns  your  barn  or  runs  off  your  stock  does  a 
slight  injury.  There  is  one  class  of  persons  who  especially 
suffer  from  this  practice.  We  refer  to  those  who  are  making 
an  honest  effort  to  reform  after  some  lapse  from  honesty  or 
chastity.  Nothing  said  here  is  in  advocacy  of  the  shielding  of  a 
villain,  but  it  is  our  duty  to  allow  our  neighbor  to  retrieve  his 
reputation  if  he  seems  disposed  to  do  so  by  a  straightforward 
life.  Let  us  suppose  a  case :  There  is  living  in  our  neighborhood 
a  man  who  came  here  ten  years  ago;  he  has  lived  that  ten 
years  a  life  of  absolute  integrity,  he  enjoys  the  confidence  of 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS  FELLOW  MAN  169 

the  entire  community.  On  every  occasion  of  testing  he  has 
shown  himself  a  man.  But  his  reputation  is  only  ten  years 
old.  No  one  knows  his  previous  life;  he  has  never  talked 
about  it  —  has  lived  strictly  in  the  present.  By-and-by  it 
transpires  that  some  one  accidentally  learns  that,  when  ten 
years  ago  he  came  and  hired  by  the  month  to  Squire  A,  he  was 
just  out  of  the  penitentiary.  We  all  know  how  that  report 
will  fly.  The  motive  usually  assigned  for  such  gossip  is  the 
love  of  truth.  The  author  holds  no  weak  theory  about  a 
man's  obligation  to  tell  the  truth,  when  he  speaks  at  all.  But 
there  are  more  facts  in  the  world  than  any  one  man  can  speak 
of  in  his  lifetime.  Moreover  some  facts  are  of  more  importance 
than  others.  One  thing  these  scandal  mongers  forget.  With 
the  fact  of  this  man's  two  years  in  prison  they  cover  up  the 
larger  fact  of  his  ten  years  of  honest  living.  After  studying 
the  motives  of  those  who  thus  "take  up  a  reproach  against 
their  neighbor,"  we  are  forced  to  conclude  that  the  plea  of 
love  of  truth  is  often  insincere.  The  source  of  the  whole 
matter  would  seem  to  be  in  intellectual  vanity  —  the  desire 
to  make  a  reputation  for  superior  discernment  in  being  able 
to  nose  out  something  which  no  one  else  has  scented. 

We  next  consider  the  duty  of  veracity.  The  constitution 
of  nature  is  a  lesson  in  truth  telling.  The  meaning  of  natural 
law  (so  called)  is  that  we  can  depend  on  the  uniformity  of 
nature.  We  have  learned  that  water  runs  down  hill.  On  no 
compulsion  must  it;  but  depending  on  it  we  drain  the  swamp 
and  tunnel  the  mountain.  We  have  observed  the  return  of 
the  seasons,  and  in  the  very  midst  of  winter  prepare  for  return- 
ing spring,  confident  that  "seed  time  and  harvest  will  not 
fail."  This  assumption  of  the  uniformity  of  nature  is  at  the 
base  of  all  induction.  Science  would  be  an  impossibility  were 
it  not  that,  as  one  has  said,  "Nature  is  an  honest  witness,  and 
to  the  proper  question  will  give  a  truthful  answer."  Man 
feels  himself  made  to  learn  the  truth,  attempts  to  learn  the 
truth,  and  is  disappointed  and  disgusted  when  he  finds  that  he 
has  deceived  himself  or  has  been  deceived  by  others.  A 
child  has  been  called  "a  complex  of  interrogation  points";  he 


i;o  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

expects  to  learn  the  truth,  until  he  finds  that  he  has  been 
deceived.  Every  society  of  men  assumes  some  regard  for 
truth  among  its  members.  Even  if  its  object  is  fraud  and 
robbery  it  must  apply  the  law  of  veracity  within  its  own  organi- 
zation. This  fact  has  given  rise  to  the  proverb  that  "  there  is 
honor  among  thieves."  The  time  when  men  left  off  to  build  a 
tower  because  all  at  once  they  were  unable  to  understand  each 
other's  speech  has  become  a  proverb  for  confusion,  but  if  in 
society  to-night  all  regard  for  truth  should  perish  so  that  to- 
morrow morning  men  would  lie  as  readily  as  they  would  tell  the 
truth  there  would  be  a  scene  that  would  out-babel  Babel.  It 
would  indeed  be  " confusion  worse  confounded."  Not  only 
do  men  expect  the  truth  of  their  fellows  but  they  prefer  to  tell 
the  truth  themselves.  The  great  amount  of  falsehood  in  the 
world  shows  the  weakness  of  men  rather  than  their  menda- 
ciousness.  It  is  not  that  they  love  truth  less  but  that  they 
love  something  else  more.  It  is  indeed  a  shame  that  so  many 
men  will  lie  under  such  small  pressure,  but  every  court  of 
justice  assumes  that  human  testimony  can  be  trusted  —  that 
men  prefer  to  tell  the  truth  and  will  do  so  in  the  absence  of  a 
motive  to  tell  a  lie.  If  you  find  a  man  out  of  whose  soul  all 
love  of  truth  has  departed,  so  that  he  not  only  will  lie  but  that 
he  prefers  a  lie  for  its  own  sake,  you  have  a  being,  humanly 
speaking,  lost  beyond  redemption.  Such  a  one  would  justify 
the  hyperbole  in  an  attorney's  denunciation  of  a  certain  witness 
that  "he  would  tell  a  lie  on  time  when  he  might  speak  the 
truth  for  cash." 

We  propose  this  statement  of  the  law  of  veracity:  When- 
ever a  man  professes  to  give  information  to  a  moral  person, 
such  information  must  be  truthful.  We  have  worded  this 
statement  carefully.  We  say  when  a  man  professes  to  give 
information;  for  we  concede  that  there  are  circumstances  when 
it  is  a  man's  duty  to  refuse  to  give  information.  We  say  "to 
a  moral  person,"  for  no  one  thinks  of  any  transgression  of  the 
law  of  veracity  in  the  use  of  strategy  in  dealing  with  the  brute. 
And  when  we  condemn  deceit  in  the  management  of  the  maniac, 
it  is  rather  on  account  of  future  complications  which  may 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO   HIS   FELLOW  MAN  171 

arise  than  from  any  supposed  guilt  incurred  in  deceiving  him. 
We  say  "when  any  one  professes  to  impart  information" ';  for 
we  can  make  no  distinction  between  "lies  spoken  and  lies  told." 
If  there  are  those  who  insist  on  an  ideal  which  demands  telling 
the  truth  in  dealing  with  the  brute,  we  will  not  argue  that 
question  with  them.  We  are  willing  that  they  should  adopt 
that  ideal  for  themselves  after  some  other  things  are  conceded. 
Our  anxiety  is  not  that  men  shall  feel  at  liberty  to  lie  to  the 
brute,  but  that  they  shall  not  feel  at  liberty  to  lie  to  their 
fellow  men.  The  certainty  of  the  law  in  a  limited  sphere  is 
more  important  than  its  extent  over  vast  realms  of  being.  A 
sense  of  obligation  which  forbids  deceiving  my  fellow  man 
for  any  selfish  advantage  will  mark  a  more  highly  developed 
character  than  will  the  admittance  of  the  brute  and  the  maniac 
to  an  equal  claim  with  men  for  the  truth.  If  I  deal  with  my 
neighbor  half  the  day  and  with  a  pig  the  other  half  it  is  better 
that  I  tell  the  truth  all  the  time  to  my  neighbor  though  I 
deceive  the  pig  every  time,  rather  than  that  I  tell  the  truth  only 
half  the  time  to  each. 

In  regard  to  the  general  doctrine  of  veracity  there  is  no 
question  among  moralists.  The  difficulties  have  arisen  over 
suggested  exceptions  to  the  rule.  The  query  has  been  raised 
whether  a  man  is  ever  justified  in  telling  a  lie.  The  question 
is  seldom  a  practical  one.  As  usually  presented  there  is  sup- 
posed some  extreme  case  of  human  suffering  or  difficulty,  and 
the  questioner  will  turn  on  me  with:  "Now,  sir,  in  that  case 
what  would  you  do?"  This  is  the  argumentum  ad  hominem, 
which  may  indeed  be  properly  employed  to  silence  a  contentious 
and  insincere  disputant,  but  is  certainly  not  conclusive  in 
serious  scientific  inquiry.  It  may  be  demurred,  "Well,  what 
of  it?  Suppose  I  own  that  probably  I  would  lie.  I  have 
sometimes  done  wrong,  and  might  do  so  again."  If,  however, 
I  postpone  my  falsehood  until  such  cases  as  the  supposed  ones 
occur  I  am  likely  to  go  through  life  a  truthful  man.  Moralists 
would  not  so  persistently  have  held  to  the  absolute  universality 
of  the  rule  had  they  apprehended  that  only  such  cases  as  the 
supposed  ones  would  find  refuge  under  the  exception.  There 


172  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

is  this  much  of  sound  reason  in  the  plea  of  those  who  contend 
for  some  exceptions  to  the  rule  of  veracity.  The  well  being  of 
some  moral  person  is  the  end  of  truth  telling.  We  cannot 
conceive  of  a  duty  which  is  not  related  to  the  good  of  some 
one.  It  is  a  question  whether  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  duty 
to  "tell  the  truth  for  the  sake  of  the  truth."  This  does  not 
concede  that  a  man  is  at  liberty  to  lie  because  he  cannot  see 
the  good  to  be  effected  by  the  truth,  or  because  he  does  see 
some  inconveniences  resulting  from  telling  it;  perhaps  also  he 
cannot  see  the  remote  but  possibly  momentous  consequences 
of  telling  a  lie.  It  is  a  serious  matter  to  weigh  simply  the 
consequences  that  are  in  sight,  and  to  determine  that  veracity 
may  be  set  aside  and  a  lie  told  for  the  end  that  some  good  may 
follow.  It  is  no  proof  of  heroism  for  us  in  these  calm  and 
quiet  days  of  peace  to  denounce  those  who  in  sore  straits 
have  spoken  falsely,  but  it  is  well  to  remember  that  the  world's 
heroes  have  been  men  who  would  not  lie  to  secure  any  advantage. 

Of  the  cases  sometimes  urged  as  exceptions  to  the  rule  of 
veracity  some  clearly  lie  outside  the  scope  of  the  law  as  we 
have  formulated  it. 

i.  The  sports  of  childhood:  In  many  of  these  the  clearly 
recognized  object  is  the  sharpening  of  each  other's  wits  by  the 
tests  of  skill  that  are  involved.  It  is  clearly  understood  that 
by  varied  feints  and  passes  one  will  mislead  the  other  if  he  can. 
It  was  one  of  the  conditions  of  the  game  understood  before  it 
was  begun.  Each  accepted  the  situation  and  told  the  other 
to  do  his  best  (or  worst)  and  neither  can  claim  that  he  has  been 
deceived.  2.  The  maneuvers  of  a  commander  in  war  which 
are  made  with  the  expectation  that  they  will  mislead  the 
enemy  are  clearly  outside  the  scope  of  our  rule.  When  men 
start  out  to  play  the  grim  game  of  war,  they  do  not  profess  to 
give  information  to  each  other.  On  the  other  hand  each  does 
profess  to  be  doing  his  best  to  lure  the  other  to  his  destruction. 
War  is  an  abnormal  state  of  affairs.  Its  ethics  (both  sides 
being  considered)  has  never  been  written.  General  Sherman  said 
"War  is  hell,"  and  he  certainly  knew  its  character.  The  con- 
science of  Christendom  sorely  needs  toning  up  as  to  the  mon- 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS   FELLOW  MAN  173 

strosity  of  war.  There  never  was  a  war  in  the  inception  of 
which  some  one  had  not  been  fearfully  guilty.  There  ought  to 
be  cultivated  among  Christian  people  a  sentiment  which  would 
make  war  between  civilized  nations  an  impossibility.  Most 
wars  could  be  avoided,  but  if  the  time  comes  —  as  indeed  it 
may  —  through  the  ruthless  attack  of  one  party,  that  one 
group  of  men  are  justified  in  killing  another  group,  it  would  seem 
strange  to  insist  that  they  were  guilty  of  turpitude  in  deceiving 
them.  If  I  so  act  —  as  indeed  I  may  —  toward  my  fellow 
that  I  forfeit  my  right  to  life,  it  would  seem  strange  to  insist 
that  I  still  have  the  right  to  the  truth  from  him.  War,  how- 
ever, is  so  abnormal  that  men  cannot  continuously  maintain 
the  attitude  of  beasts  toward  each  other.  Formally  or  infor- 
mally every  war  has  its  truces  in  which  enemies  meet,  not  as 
beasts  but  as  men.  And  here  every  honorable  combatant 
recognizes  the  law  of  veracity  in  its  full  force.  3.  In  dealing 
with  the  insane  our  rule  does  not  apply  for  the  reason  that  the 
maniac  is  not  a  moral  person.  But  this  liberty  has  been  badly 
abused.  Injudicious  attendants  often  tell  lies  to  their  charges 
when,  in  the  long  run,  truth  would  serve  their  purpose  better. 
On  the  simple  ground  of  expediency  some  of  the  best  alienists 
are  accustomed  to  say  to  their  assistants,  "Do  not  deceive  a 
patient." 

Some  teachers  have  proposed  to  limit  the  application  of 
the  law  of  veracity  to  the  cases  where  the  questioner  has  the 
right  to  the  information  he  seeks.  There  is  a  difficulty  here. 
Not  always  but  often  it  is  an  open  question  as  to  the  inter- 
rogator's right  to  the  truth,  and  it  is  surely  a  grave  assumption 
that  pending  that  decision  I  have  a  right  to  lie  to  him.  The 
difficulty  is  best  solved  by  simply  closing  the  lips  and  refusing 
to  testify.  Indeed  a  large  number  of  those  cases  where  false- 
hood is  generally  condoned  are  effectually  met  in  the  exercise 
of  what  Dr.  Lieber  has  aptly  called  "the  liberty  of  silence." 
It  may  be  contended  that  such  a  refusal  would  put  the  officious 
questioner  in  possession  of  the  truth  to  which  he  has  no  right. 
But  his  supposed  knowledge  is  an  inference  from  your  silence, 
which  may  have  more  than  one  reason,  and  inferences  are  like 


174  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

some  kinds  of  freight  on  the  railroads,  "  taken  at  the  owner's 
risk."  When  I  "simply  refuse  to  be  interviewed,"  I  certainly 
am  not  responsible  for  the  questioner's  inferences,  but  I  clearly 
am  responsible  if,  consenting  to  the  interview  and  professing 
to  give  information,  I  utter  a  falsehood. 

Against  several  common  evasions  of  the  law  of  veracity  we 
must  raise  a  protest:  i.  The  practice  of  deceiving  the  sick. 
Unless  delirious  the  sick  man  is  a  moral  person  and  of  all 
persons  he  has  a  right  to  know  the  truth.  No  case  is  so  fre- 
quently urged  as  an  exception  to  the  law  of  veracity  as  this, 
and  it  is  admitted  that  no  other  presents  so  plausible  an  appear- 
ance. We  all  know  the  importance  in  some  stages  of  disease 
of  keeping  the  patient  in  a  tranquil  state  of  mind,  and  it  is  not 
uncommon  to  censure  the  candid  nurse  or  physician  for  the 
evil  results  following  a  truthful  utterance.  It  will  be  observed 
that  it  is  a  case  of  an  appeal  to  consequences.  Conceding  the 
legitimacy  of  such  an  appeal  we  insist  that  before  setting  the 
law  of  veracity  aside,  one  should  know  with  reasonable  cer- 
tainty all  the  consequences  not  alone  of  telling  the  truth  or  of 
refusing  to  give  information  now,  but  also  the  consequences  near 
and  remote  of  the  proposed  falsehood.  There  will  be  other  sick 
people;  perhaps  some  of  those  who  now  observe  the  treatment 
of  this  case.  This  man  may  recover,  and  be  sick  again,  and 
when  he  is  told  the  truth  he  may  not  believe  it.  2.  The 
preservation  of  one's  reputation  is  not  a  sufficient  reason  for 
resorting  to  falsehood.  The  story  of  George  Washington  and 
his  little  hatchet  is  no  doubt  apocryphal,  but  it  has  strengthened 
the  moral  fiber  of  many  a  tempted  youth.  Would  that  a  like 
service  might  be  rendered  to  all  "grown  ups."  The  man  with 
a  reputation  fortified  by  falsehood  suffers  in  two  respects: 
There  is  ever  before  him  the  fear  that  "the  truth  will  out." 
"A  lie  cannot  live  forever."  Worse  still  he  has  preserved  his 
reputation  at  the  expense  of  his  own  self  respect.  He  must 
ever  hear  the  voice  of  Holmes'  "other  fellow"  saying,  "You 
are  a  sneak."  3.  The  law  of  veracity  may  not  be  set  aside 
for  any  amount  of  financial  gain.  Perhaps  half  of  the  false- 
hood in  the  world  has  no  higher  justification  than  this.  The 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS   FELLOW  MAN  175 

susceptibility  of  men  to  this  temptation  gave  rise  to  the  saying 
that  every  man  has  his  price.  It  is  not  true.  There  are 
thousands  of  men  whom  no  financial  consideration  can  at  all 
move  to  turn  aside  from  adherence  to  the  truth. 

4.  A  man  has  no  right  to  lie  in  order  to  promote  a  good 
cause.  No  more  mischievous  application  of  the  maxim  that 
"the  end  justifies  the  means"  was  ever  made  than  this.  Both 
in  Romanist  and  Protestant  communions  men  have  "done 
evil  that  good  may  come."  Against  it  we  would  interpose 
the  startling  statement  that  one  has  no  right  to  lie  even  for 
what  seems  to  him  the  prospect  of  saving  a  soul.  The  man 
may  lose  his  own  soul  and  yet  fail  to  accomplish  the  good  end 
sought.  His  conduct  shows  a  surprising  lack  of  faith  in  those 
unseen  forces  in  the  universe  and  above  the  universe  which 
make  for  righteousness.  Surely  He  who  said,  "To  this  end 
was  I  born  and  for  this  cause  came  I  into  the  world  that  I 
might  bear  witness  unto  the  truth,"  never  intended  that  one  of 
his  servants  should  help  him  by  treason  to  the  cause  for  which 
He  gave  Himself. 

A  closing  word  regarding  our  formulation  of  the  rule:  We 
have  seen  that  the  difficulties  in  applying  the  law  of  veracity 
lay  not  in  the  general  acceptance  of  the  duty  of  truthfulness, 
but  in  certain  exceptional  cases.  We  have  tried  to  formulate  a 
rule  which  would  be  consistent  with  the  solution  of  those  cases 
where  "common  sense"  would  say  that  a  revelation  of  the 
truth  should  not  be  made.  Admitting  that  our  rule  does  leave 
outside  its  scope  a  great  number  of  those  cases  in  which  difficulty 
has  been  found,  we  claim  that  most  of  such  cases  can  be  solved 
by  the  application  of  the  "liberty  of  silence."  We  believe  the 
rule  does  take  within  its  scope  and  clearly  forbid  ninety-nine 
per  cent  of  the  falsehood  of  the  world.  We  conclude  by  stating 
again  our  law:  Whenever  a  man  professes  to  give  information 
to  a  moral  person,  such  information  must  be  truthful. 


CHAPTER  XI 
DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS  FELLOW  MAN— CONTINUED 

Beneficence 

JUSTICE  and  Veracity  are  only  a  part  of  benevolence.  They 
are  passive  virtues  only.  In  their  exercise  a  man  simply 
refrains  from  doing  evil.  Benevolence  —  good- willing  —  must 
issue  in  something  active,  in  beneficence  —  good-doing.  We 
hold  that  a  man  is  prompted  to  good-doing  by  his  natural 
sympathies.  Whenever  he  reflects  that  his  fellow  man  is  a 
being  with  a  nature  like  his  own  he  is  prompted  to  make  his 
sympathetic  impulses  permanent  and  practical  by  activities  of 
will.  These  sympathies  are  not  selfish.  A  man  is  as  truly 
(though  not  so  forcefully)  impelled  to  seek  the  good  of  his 
neighbor  as  to  seek  his  own.  There  have  been  moralists  who 
have  attempted  to  resolve  every  generous  impulse  into  selfish- 
ness or  at  best  into  a  refined  self-love.  It  has  been  found  that 
generous  feelings  are  pleasant  and  that  generous  deeds  are 
followed  by  pleasant  reflections  and  self  approval.  Therefore 
it  is  claimed  that  the  man  was  selfish  in  doing  these  things  for 
the  pleasantly  affected  sensibilities.  But  what  shall  we  say  of 
the  constitution  of  that  nature  which  was  capable  of  being 
pleasantly  affected  by  self-forgetful  and  self-denying  acts? 
An  anecdote  of  Lincoln  is  used  in  this  connection.  He  once 
dismounted  and  walked  back  forty  rods  through  the  mud  to 
help  out  a  pig  caught  in  the  fence,  saying  that  the  thought  of 
the  creature's  suffering  was  distressing  to  him.  It  is  argued 
that  his  conduct  was  selfish  because  he  sought  relief  from 
unpleasant  feelings.  But  what  shall  we  say  of  that  nature 
which  could  not  forget  the  suffering  pig  and  was  capable  of 
being  unpleasantly  affected  by  it?  If  that  were  selfish,  give 
us  more  of  the  Sfame  kind. 

But  it  must  be  conceded  that  there  is  a  considerable  amount 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS   FELLOW  MAN  177 

of  self  love  that  does  seek  to  hide  itself  under  a  mask  of  gener- 
osity. What  sacrifices  some  politicians  are  willing  to  make  one 
in  order  to  serve  the  dear  people  in  Congress?  We  are  told  that 
in  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era  there  were  those  who  gave 
alms  "to  be  seen  of  men."  Paul  tells  us  that  in  his  time  there 
were  those  who  even  preached  Christ  to  gratify  "envy  and 
strife."  It  is  well  known  that  now  there  are  some  men  who 
will  build  hospitals  and  endow  colleges  for  the  fame  it  brings 
them.  Since  so  much  of  generous  action  has  been  found 
tainted  with  selfishness,  some  have  jumped  to  the  conclusion 
that  it  is  all  so.  There  is  no  more  profitless  exercise  than 
trying  to  ferret  out  some  sinister  motive  for  the  beneficent 
activities  of  men.  There  are  those  who  seem  to  rival  Satan  in 
asking:  "Doth  Job  fear  God  for  nought?"  No  doubt  the 
difficulty  in  settling  the  question  of  our  own  motives  is  often 
increased  by  the  fact  that  generous  conduct  toward  our  neigh- 
bors is  attended  nearly  or  remotely  with  benefit  to  ourselves. 
We  may  frankly  concede  that  an  act  which  is  of  advantage  to 
the  doer  as  well  as  the  recipient  is  more  easily  performed. 
Doubtless  there  was  truth  in  the  confession  which  a  rustic 
once  made  to  the  author:  "I  do  like  to  accommodate  my 
neighbors  when  I  can  accommodate  myself  at  the  same  time." 
But  the  question  is  not  whether  or  not  altruistic  motives  are 
sometimes  reinforced  by  the  egoistic,  but  whether  the  altruistic 
are  possible  independent  of  the  other.  If  altruism  in  fact 
exist,  it  is  independent.  The  same  external  act  may  be 
prompted  by  both  classes  of  motives  yet  one  not  be  evolved 
from  the  other.  We  believe  this  because:  i.  The  two  kinds 
of  feeling  as  subjective  experiences  are  so  entirely  unlike  that 
it  seems  inconceivable  that  one  should  have  grown  out  of  the 
other.  2.  Large  numbers  of  men  have  at  certain  times  in 
their  lives  done  things  in  the  service  of  their  fellows  for  which 
no  self  interest  of  any  kind  could  by  any  possibility  be  assigned 
as  a  motive.  3.  There  have  been  a  few  men  and  women  of  such 
absolute  and  transparent  self  forgetfulness  that  their  altruism 
could  not  be  seriously  questioned.  4.  Each  one  may  assure 
himself  of  the  truth  by  an  appeal  to  his  own  consciousness. 


178  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

If  at  this  moment  my  conscious  existence  were  to  come  to  an 
end  —  my  very  being  be  blotted  out  —  I  do  know  that  with 
my  last  expiring  breath  I  would  desire  the  well  being  of  my 
race.  Therefore,  although  not  so  generally  apparent  on  the 
surface,  we  are  warranted  in  concluding  that  altruism  is  as 
really  a  part  of  normal  human  nature  as  egoism.  We  will 
next  consider  the  several  forms  of  altruistic  activity  manifested 
in:  i.  The  relief  of  physical  wants.  2.  The  alleviation  of  a 
man's  burdens  through  sympathy.  3.  Dispelling  human  igno- 
rance. 4.  Restraining  and  correcting  or  if  possible  preventing 
human  vices. 

The  relief  of  physical  suffering  is  named  first  as  being  the 
most  obvious  form  of  beneficent  action.  That  this  is  a  duty 
will  not  be  questioned  by  any  one  who  at  all  admits  the  existence 
of  obligation  to  altruistic  effort.  Of  those  philosophers  who 
have  gravely  argued  the  impropriety  of  aiding  the  weak  in  their 
struggle  for  existence,  it  is  to  be  remarked  that  generally  their 
lives  have  been  better  than  their  theories.  Constituted  as  we 
are,  physical  suffering  must  always  strongly  appeal  to  us,  and 
he  who  in  its  presence  feels  no  impulse  to  relieve  it  may  well  be 
ashamed.  If  such  suffering  always  came  upon  a  man  by  his 
own  fault;  if  it  were  the  transgressors  alone;  if  the  man 
could  survive  while  the  deep  underlying  cause  of  his  misery 
were  being  reached, — if  these  and  perhaps  fifty  other  "ifs" 
were  met,  we  might  then  justify  the  indifference  of  those 
who  would  "shut  up  their  tender  heart  of  compassion."  Until 
then  the  blessing  of  God  and  of  good  men  will  be  upon  those 
who  deal  their  bread  to  the  hungry.  This  is  said  in  full  acknowl- 
edgment that  a  man  is  bound  to  the  use  of  discretion  in  the 
selection  of  the  objects  and  the  means  of  his  charitable  action. 
It  is  only  contended  that  the  suffering  of  the  profligate  and 
the  tramp  does  call  for  relief  in  some  manner,  and  whatever  the 
appropriate  remedy  may  be,  the  indifferent  "don't  care"  and 
"good  enough  for  him"  is  not  the  remedy.  It  may  not  always 
be  best,  when  the  tramp  asks  for  bread  to  give  him  bread, 
neither  is  it  clear  that  he  should  be  given  a  stone.  It  is  possible 
that  the  appropriate  thing  is  a  stone  pile  and  a  hammer,  but 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO   HIS   FELLOW  MAN  179 

he  should  not  be  sent  away  hungry.  It  may  be  conceded  that 
much  of  our  common  alms-giving  is  misdirected,  and  that 
better  means  couid  be  devised  for  the  relief  of  distress.  This 
admission  does  not  weaken  in  the  least  our  contention  that  the 
relief  of  physical  suffering  has  a  very  high  place  among  the 
duties  that  a  man  owes  to  his  fellow  man.  One  reason  for 
the  prominence  rightly  given  to  this  class  of  duties  is  the 
imperative  character  of  the  wants  that  are  involved.  Some 
wants  may  be  satisfied  to-morrow,  but  the  wounded  Jew  by  the 
roadside  needs  help  now.  The  demand  for  food  and  drink  is 
properly  considered  not  the  highest  of  our  wants.  The  satis- 
faction of  eating  and  drinking  is  really  a  lower  good,  and  yet  it 
is  so  imperative  that  if  the  food  supply  in  a  city  were  shut  off 
for  forty-eight  hours  we  would  find  other  things  largely  for- 
gotten. The  services  in  the  churches  would  be  dismissed,  the 
schools  would  close,  business  would  be  suspended,  and  there 
would  be  just  one  pressing  question:  "Where  can  we  get 
something  to  eat?"  When  young  Copperfield  presented 
himself  dusty,  footsore,  weary,  and  hungry  before  his  maiden 
aunt,  she  asked  Mr.  Dick:  "What  shall  we  do  with  him?" 
and  received  a  very  short  answer  in  two  injunctions:  "wash 
him"  and  "feed  him."  All  successful  reformers  take  these 
wants  into  account.  The  Salvation  Army  understands  not 
only  that  a  hungry  man  cannot  preach,  but  that  you  cannot 
preach  to  a  hungry  man. 

Our  second  class  of  duties  to  our  fellows  is  comprehended  in 
the  word  sympathy.  The  desire  to  relieve  physical  wants  is 
also  sometimes  called  sympathy,  because  we  lack  the  proper 
English  word  for  it.  It  is  a  feeling  for  or  on  account  of,  while 
sympathy,  properly  so  called,  is  a  feeling  with.  Not  only  do 
the  two  feelings  differ  as  subjective  experiences,  but  they  are 
applicable  to  different  classes  of  human  beings.  Man  is  not 
a  solitary  animal,  he  is  a  social  being.  There  are  large  num- 
bers of  men  and  women  who  are  able  and  willing  to  carry  their 
own  burdens  and  expect  to  do  so,  without  any  material  aid, 
but  who  do  need,  desire  and  long  for  the  comfort  that  comes 
from  knowing  that  "my  neighbor  takes  some  account  of  me"; 


180  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

that  "he  sorrows  when  I  sorrow"  and  "rejoices  when  I  rejoice." 
There  is  unutterable  loneliness  in  the  cry  of  the  ancient  bard. 
"No  man  careth  for  my  soul."  The  appropriate  field  for  the 
manifestation  of  this  sympathy  is  in  what  we  know  as  "social 
life"  sometimes  called  "society." 

The  term  is  not  very  definite  in  its  import,  though  wide  in 
its  application.  It  designates  all  those  meetings  and  associa- 
tions of  human  beings,  the  purpose  of  which  is  the  stimulus  of 
friendly  emotions  among  those  associated.  Social  life  includes 
many  forms  of  association,  the  little  child  saying  "Let's  go 
play."  Two  housemaids  exchanging  gossip  over  the  back 
fence;  a  company  of  loafers  swapping  coarse  jokes  around  the 
stove  in  the  corner  grocery;  all  forms  of  "spreads,"  "parties," 
"receptions"  up  to  those  elaborate  functions  of  the  President 
of  the  United  States.  The  theory  that  our  social  life  as  thus 
defined  is  a  field  for  the  alleviation  of  human  suffering  through 
sympathy  may  not  agree  with  the  usages  of  so-called  "society." 
Most  people  seem  to  be  "in  society"  for  what  they  can  get 
out  of  it;  while  with  the  above  view  the  thought  of  each  one 
would  be:  how  much  can  I  put  into  it?  The  occasions  on 
which  men  and  women  meet  and  mingle  socially  ought  to 
leave  each  one  a  little  stronger  as  well  as  lighter  of  heart 
than  when  he  came.  Among  the  chapters  of  MORAL  SCIENCE 
which  are  yet  to  be  written  there  is  one  on  this  theme,  but  the 
author  of  this  work  will  not  attempt  it.  Evidently  the  man 
who  would  write  adequately  of  "social  life"  as  it  ought  to  be, 
should  know  social  life  as  it  is.  He  should  be  a  moral  philosopher 
and  also  a  so-called  "society  man."  Unfortunately,  Ward 
McAllister's  "four  hundred"  are  not  given  to  the  study  of 
moral  science;  and  in  general  moral  philosophers  are  not 
"society  men."  We  only  venture  a  very  few  observations. 
We  have  said  that  there  has  been  a  general  failure  to  apprehend 
the  utility  of  social  life  as  affording  a  field  for  the  exercise  of 
sympathy.  An  apprehension  of  the  possibilities  here  would 
modify  many  things.  Social  lines  of  cleavage  would  be  re- 
adjusted. We  are  not  prepared  to  say  how  they  would  be  drawn; 
perhaps  there  would  be  none  except  on  the  basis  of  character. 


I 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS   FELLOW  MAN  181 

Certainly  there  would  not  be,  as  now,  hard  and  fast  lines  on 
the  basis  of  wealth  and  culture.  There  is  one  utterance  of 
Jesus  that  in  this  connection  should  be  pondered:  "  When  thou 
makest  a  dinner  or  a  supper,  call  not  thy  friends,  nor  thy 
brethren,  neither  thy  kinsmen,  nor  thy  rich  neighbors;  lest  they 
also  bid  thee  again  and  a  recompense  be  made  thee.  But 
when  thou  makest  a  feast,  call  the  poor,  the  maimed,  the  lame, 
the  blind;  and  thou  shalt  be  blessed;  for  they  cannot  recom- 
pense thee;  for  thou  shalt  be  recompensed  at  the  resurrection 
of  the  just."  Luke  xiv  113-14.  No  doubt  this  is  one  of  those 
sayings  of  which  it  is  true  that  "the  letter  killeth"  but  "the 
spirit  [of  it]  giveth  life."  We  must  find  what  that  spirit 
requires  of  us  in  the  readjustment  of  our  social  life. 

In  view  of  this  broad  conception  of  the  end  of  "society"  it 
is  evidently  a  mistake  to  prolong  social  functions  until  they 
produce  weariness  of  body  or  mind.  There  is  cause  for  appre- 
hension as  we  see  growing  up  in  our  once  simple  Western  life, 
the  custom  of  prolonging  the  hours  of  festivity.  That  was  a 
wise  man  who  once  wrote:  "Woe  unto  thee,  O  land,  when  thy 
king  is  a  child,  and  thy  princes  eat  in  the  morning  [i.e.,  after 
midnight] ;  happy  art  thou,  O  land,  when  thy  king  is  the  son  of 
nobles,  and  thy  princes  eat  in  due  season  for  strength  and  not 
for  drunkenness."  Ecclesiastes  x:i6-i7. 

Modern  society  has  a  prohibition  expressed  usually  in  the 
saying:  "Do  not  talk  shop"  which  unless  observed  in  modera- 
tion tends  to  frustrate  the  purpose  of  our  association.  Your 
neighbor  really  wants  to  talk  shop;  he  can  talk  shop  better 
than  anything  else.  His  shop  is  hateful  to  him  only  because 
he  has  to  work  it  alone.  Let  him  feel  that  you  are  interested 
in  him  and  his  work  and  straightway  his  shop  is  transfigured 
before  him.  It  is  usually  safe  to  talk  "the  other  fellow's 
shop." 

An  effort  to  divert  and  amuse  can  easily  be  overdone.  Is 
it  not  a  reflection  on  the  intelligence  of  your  guests  to  assume 
that  they  must  be  provided  with  some  diversion  to  prevent 
them  growing  weary  of  one  another's  company?  We  would  not 
ignore  the  good  there  is  in  a  hearty  laugh,  but  we  have  caused 


182  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

him  for  a  moment  only  to  forget  his  burden.  He  has  to  take  it 
up  again  and  it  is  as  heavy  as  ever.  To  most  men  there  is  more 
help  that  abides  in  the  cordial  handshake,  and  the  really 
sincere  inquiry  about  his  welfare  than  in  the  best  joke  that  can 
be  repeated  to  him. 

Beneficent  action  finds  a  third  field  in  the  work  of  dispell- 
ing human  ignorance,  and  supplying  the  minds  of  men  with  a 
knowledge  of  truth.  Every  man  who  makes  a  useful  discovery 
owes  it  to  the  world  to  make  it  known.  Every  one  who  dis- 
covers a  truth  which  may  aid  in  the  satisfaction  of  human 
wants  should  feel  in  duty  bound  to  give  it  to  the  world.  There 
is  much  to  be  said  against  the  effort  to  capitalize  brains  by 
guarding  secret  processes  in  industry.  The  good  man  who  con- 
ceives a  great  thought  is  usually  glad  to  make  it  known.  Great 
moralists  have  been  great  teachers  from  the  days  of  Socrates 
to  the  days  of  Mark  Hopkins. 

Not  many  persons,  however,  can  hope  to  become  dis- 
coverers of  new  and  important  truths.  Far  the  greater  portion 
of  beneficent  action  of  the  sort  we  are  considering  will  consist 
in  furnishing  opportunity  for  all  who  will  to  acquire  that 
knowledge  which  has  already  become  the  heritage  of  the  race. 
This  field  of  beneficent  action  widens  and  lengthens  with  each 
generation.  The  things  which  a  man  needs  to  know,  which 
it  would  be  greatly  to  his  advantage  to  know,  become  more 
numerous  with  each  succeeding  age.  The  stock  of  "innate 
ideas "(?)  has  received  no  perceptible  addition  within  the 
historic  period.  The  babe  born  in  America  last  night  is  just  as 
ignorant  as  was  any  one  of  his  ancestors  born  in  one  of  the  caves 
of  prehistoric  Britain  or  Germany,  while  the  amount  which  it 
is  important  that  he  shall  come  to  know  in  order  that  he  may 
become  a  conventionally  decent  citizen  is  many  fold  greater. 
Every  increase  in  knowledge  increases  the  demand  for  knowl- 
edge. Besides  the  home  we  would  name  as  the  chief  agencies 
for  imparting  information,  the  pulpit,  the  school,  the  press, 
and  the  lyceum.  Without  any  discussion  of  the  rules  for  the 
conduct  of  each  of  these  institutions,  attention  is  called  to  the 
fact  that  whoever  enters  for  his  life  work  any  one  of  them 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS  FELLOW  MAN  183 

accepts  responsibility  for  a  large  measure  of  the  sort  of  beneficent 
action  now  under  consideration. 

But  a  large  amount  of  teaching  is  done  in  a  purely  uncon- 
ventional manner.  Whenever  men  are  associated  in  any 
relation  in  business,  industry,  or  social  life,  or  even  accidentally 
as  in  travel,  they  are  likely  in  some  measure  to  teach  each  the 
other.  This  is  true  even  when  there  is  no  conscious  effort  to 
do  so.  Much  more  if  there  is  rationally  directed  effort.  It 
is  a  good  rule  of  life  to  seek  to  learn  something  from  every 
associate;  the  converse  is  equally  good:  if  one  has  anything 
worth  knowing,  teach  it  to  somebody.  This  does  not  necessi- 
tate that  I  assume  an  air  of  superior  wisdom.  Very  often  I 
may  best  accomplish  what  I  purpose  by  assuming  the  attitude 
of  a  learner.  But  the  child  or  the  man  whose  opportunities 
have  been  less  than  mine  should  go  from  an  hour's  converse 
with  me  knowing  something  worth  while,  which  he  did  not 
know  before. 

The  last  form  of  beneficent  action  which  we  consider  is  the 
correction  of  human  vices.  The  correction  of  men  on  occasion 
of  their  vicious  conduct  is  usually  delegated  to  the  activity  of 
the  state,  because  the  state  can  more  efficiently  do  the  work. 
But  let  it  be  remembered  that  the  sources  of  every  duty  of 
the  state  are  in  individual  duty.  The  state  has  no  duties 
which  individuals  have  not  assigned  it.  The  state  can  do  no 
evil  that  some  individuals  are  not  responsible  for. 

From  the  time  that  Moses  slew  the  Egyptian  down  to  the 
days  of  chivalry  those  who  have  stood  for  the  defense  of  the 
weak  have  seen  in  this  defense  a  duty  to  the  individual  only 
who  had  suffered  wrong.  Another  idea  has  slowly  been  dawn- 
ing on  us.  A  man  breaks  into  a  store  and  steals.  Every  one 
sees  that  we  owe  a  duty  to  the  merchant.  That  duty  requires 
us  to  arrest  and  deal  with  the  thief.  It  has  not  so  generally 
been  apprehended  that  the  state  owes  that  same  duty  to  the 
thief  himself.  It  may  be  profitable  for  us  to  consider  the 
different  motives  which  may  prompt  the  punishment  of  a 
criminal.  We  have  already  noted  that  punishment  of  crime  is 
older  than  the  state.  Indeed,  had  not  men  been  accustomed 


184  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

to  punishing  wrong  doing  before  the  state  was  instituted,  it 
may  be  questioned  whether  the  state  would  have  so  universally 
assumed  that  function.  Two  distinct  questions  present  them- 
selves. We  may  ask  historically,  What  motives  have  in  the 
past  prompted  men  to  the  punishment  of  evil  doers?  and 
what  considerations  will,  at  the  bar  of  a  good  conscience,  justify 
us  in  inflicting  punishment  on  him?  We  would  name  first  as 
inciting  us  to  the  punishment  of  the  criminal  the  supposed 
turpitude  of  the  offender,  arousing  in  us  the  feeling  of  demerit; 
the  feeling  that  ill  doing  deserves  an  ill  return.  We  discussed 
the  nature  of  this  feeling  sufficiently  in  our  previous  study. 
Our  only  purpose  here  is  to  consider  its  relation  to  the  punish- 
ment of  crime.  This  sense  of  demerit  is  an  active  impelling 
force,  prompting  to  punishment.  But  there  is  nothing  in  it 
telling  you  how  to  do  or  when  to  stop.  The  ill  desert  of  the 
criminal  would  seem  to  be  a  necessary  condition,  without 
which  it  would  be  improper  to  punish  him  at  all,  but  it  may  be 
questioned  whether  the  ill  desert  of  the  offender  is  alone  suf- 
ficent  to  warrant  the  infliction  of  the  punishment.  Is  it  any- 
where made  apparent  that  there  is  a  moral  necessity  in  the 
universe  that  each  one  must  suffer  the  full  extent  of  his  ill 
deserts?  And  if  there  were  who  has  pronounced  on  your  com- 
petence or  mine  to  weigh  that  ill  desert,  or  has  made  us  the 
executors  of  our  own  righteous  but  indignant  judgment?  The 
most  that  can  be  said  is  that  in  the  presence  of  some  imminent 
good  —  the  welfare  of  some  sentient  being  —  demanding  the 
punishment  of  the  criminal;  then  only  will  the  ill  desert  of  the 
criminal  justify  his  punishment  and  that  only  to  the  extent 
and  in  the  manner  necessary  to  secure  that  good.  Let  us  look 
at  the  several  goods  to  secure  which  punishment  has  been 
inflicted.  We  name  as  a  very  prominent  one  the  satisfaction 
of  the  persons  whom  the  evil  doer  has  wronged.  Compared 
with  this  the  sense  of  the  evil  doer's  ill  desert  has  played  in  the 
past  a  small  part  in  the  administration  of  justice.  It  is  not  so 
much  that  the  criminal  has  done  evil,  and  so  deserves  to  suffer 
as  that  he  has  injured  me,  and  therefore  I  want  to  injure  him, 
and  while  I  am  at  it,  a  little  more  than  he  has  injured  me. 


DUTIES  OF  A  MAN  TO  HIS  FELLOW  MAN  185 

Discreditable  as  it  is  to  human  nature,  such  we  must  conclude 
was  the  state  of  the  case  when,  on  the  organization  of  the 
state,  society  took  over  the  administration  of  justice.  The 
state  now  assumes  to  do  that  which  the  individual  had  been 
doing  (and  often  overdoing)  for  himself.  It  is  easy  to  see 
how  in  primitive  judicial  affairs  the  prominent  idea  would  be 
that  of  rendering  satisfaction  to  the  party  against  whom  the 
offense  had  been  committed.  In  some  cases  this  would  seem 
appropriate.  A  man  steals  my  goods  and  has  them  in  his 
possession;  to  take  them  from  him  and  restore  them  to  me 
with  a  sufficient  margin  to  "cover  expenses"  seems  to  commend 
itself  to  us  as  just  and  right.  But  there  are  other  cases  and 
aggravated  ones  which  do  not  admit  of  so  simple  a  solution. 
A  man  attacks  me  on  the  highway;  robs  me  and  takes  my  life. 
My  wife  wishes  him  punished;  he  is  arrested.  What  shall  be 
done  with  him?  Ask  her.  "Hang  him!"  For  what  good? 
"He  deserves  to  die.  Life  for  life,"  she  says.  But  that  is  not 
possible.  You  may  take  his  life,  but  that  will  not  bring  back 
mine,  nor  lighten  by  one  poor  scruple  my  wife's  crushing 
grief.  The  only  satisfaction  to  her  is  that  found  in  the  grati- 
fication of  revengeful  hate.  No,  we  must  find  some  greater, 
some  more  rational  good  than  is  implied  in  "an  eye  for  an 
eye"  or  we  will  have  to  let  the  most  flagrant  offenders  go  free. 
The  next  good  adduced  for  the  punishment  of  the  criminal  is 
the  protection  of  society.  The  ill  desert  of  the  criminal  being 
admitted  this  would  seem  to  be  sufficient  reason,  not  otherwise. 
We  would  have  no  right  to  punish  an  innocent  man,  either 
for  "the  glory  of  God,"  or  the  protection  of  the  members  of 
the  state.  This  protection  of  society  may  be  either  protection 
from  this  particular  criminal  who  has  learned  that  the  way  of 
the  transgressor  is  hard,  or  it  may  be  from  other  men  of  similar 
tendencies  who  it  is  hoped  will  profit  by  his  example.  Another 
good  sought  in  the  punishment  of  the  evil  doer,  and  we  believe 
the  very  highest  one,  is  the  reformation  of  the  criminal  himself. 
It  must  be  conceded  that  the  protection  of  society  cannot  wait 
upon  the  reformation  of  the  evil  doer,  hence  there  will  be  cases 
of  punitive  measures  which  will  seem  to  have  little  relation  to 


i86  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

reformation.  Yet  we  hold  that  the  desire  to  restore  the  criminal 
to  society,  transformed  into  a  good  citizen,  is  the  very  highest 
motive  for  subjecting  him  to  discipline.  The  state  which  in 
any  way  protects  itself  in  the  punishment  of  the  criminal  has 
entered  into  partnership  with  an  avenging  angel.  The  state 
which  protects  itself  by  reforming  the  criminal  has  entered  into 
unity  with  the  tender  heart  of  Jehovah.  And  here  again  the 
ill  desert  of  the  offender  must  be  assumed,  otherwise  it  might 
be  difficult  to  justify  our  trespass  upon  his  liberty,  even  for 
' '  pedagogical  purposes. ' ' 

It  is  to  the  everlasting  glory  of  the  Christian  church  that 
in  the  very  darkest  of  the  dark  ages  it  introduced  this  idea  into 
the  discipline  of  the  church  from  which  in  time  it  began  to 
find  its  way  into  jurisprudence.  True,  not  one  churchman  in 
a  thousand  saw  it  clearly.  Most  men,  if  at  all,  see  it  only 
dimly  yet,  but  with  the  advance  of  that  truth  which  has  ages 
for  its  own  more  and  more  will  the  idea  make  itself  felt  both 
in  legislative  enactment  and  in  judicial  procedure. 


CHAPTER  XII 
DUTIES  TO  GOD 

IN  a  previous  chapter  we  observed  that  it  is  possible  to  consider 
all  a  man's  duties  to  himself  and  to  his  neighbor  to  be  in  a 
secondary  sense  duties  to  God.  If  we  conceive  the  relations  of 
a  man  to  his  fellow  to  be  a  matter  of  concern  to  the  Creator 
and  that  he  has  in  any  way  expressed  his  will  regarding  them, 
then  every  duty  which  a  man  primarily  owes  to  his  neighbor 
is  reinforced  by  his  obligation  on  that  point  to  God.  Here 
originates  our  word  Religion.  It  binds  again  by  another  bond 
that  to  which  we  were  obligated  before  by  another  bond.  But 
having  classified  duties  with  reference  to  the  beings  on  whom 
the  activities  terminate,  or  to  whom  they  are  directed,  our 
quest  at  this  point  is  for  those  forms  of  obligated  activity 
which  are  primarily  duties  to  God.  And  here  Ethics  waits 
on  Theology.  What  a  man  believes  to  be  his  duty  to  God  will 
depend  largely  on  his  thought  as  to  the  kind  of  a  being  that 
God  is.  It  must  be  conceded  that  the  ordinary  company  of 
church  goers  is  not  as  vitally  interested  in  the  consideration  of 
this  theme  as  was  the  congregation  of  fifty  or  a  hundred  years 
ago.  When  a  gross  materialistic  philosophy  held  the  minds 
of  men  enthralled;  when  most  Christians  believed  in  a  Hades 
made  of  material  burning  brimstone,  into  which  a  vengeful 
Deity  with  inexpressible  delight  hurled  human  souls  clothed 
in  immortalized  flesh,  there  to  fry  and  broil  eternally,  then  it 
was  easy  to  interest  men  in  the  question  of  duties  to  God. 
Indeed  the  question  as  to  how  a  man  should  treat  his  neighbor 
was  a  trifling  one  compared  with  the  more  absorbing  one  as 
to  how  he  might  secure  the  forbearance  of  this  avenging  God. 
But  there  have  been  changes  in  the  thought,  even  of  those 
who,  like  the  author,  do  still  believe  in  the  possibility  of  the 
total,  the  irretrievable,  the  unspeakable,  the  irreversible,  and 


i88  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

eternal  ruin  of  the  human  spirit.  We  no  longer  understand 
that  the  anguish  of  a  lost  soul  consists  in  the  roasting  of  the 
flesh  of  the  body.  A  more  enlightened  view  of  the  character 
of  the  Deity  has  led  us  to  believe  that  whatever  that  woe  may 
be  it  is  not  of  God's  will  but  against  his  will  that  any  human 
soul  perishes.  We  believe  these  changes  to  be  in  the  direction 
of  a  better  understanding  of  the  truth,  and  yet  it  must  be 
conceded  that  one  of  their  incidental  effects  has  been  to  pro- 
duce in  the  minds  of  many  men  an  utter  indifference  as  to 
their  duties  to  God.  Because  we  are  unable  to  describe  in 
literal  terms  that  for  which  Jesus  used  a  metaphor,  men  have 
concluded  that  a  life  of  rebellion  against  Eternal  Love  is  not 
so  very  serious,  and  that  to  be  a  lost  soul  is  not  so  very  bad 
after  all.  Many  men  in  the  average  Protestant  congregation 
are  in  their  practical  theology  not  one  whit  different  from  the 
Congo  negroes  who  laughed  at  the  missionary  for  expecting 
them  to  worship  a  Deity  who  was  not  disposed  to  hurt  anybody. 
The  higher  a  man's  conception  of  Deity,  the  more  spiritualized 
is  his  worship,  and  the  smaller  is  the  place  held  by  externals 
in  his  theopathic  activities.  Barbarous  peoples  lay  great  stress 
on  elaborate  ceremonials,  and  believing  Deity  to  have  wants 
like  themselves  are  accustomed  to  make  costly  offerings  of 
food  and  drink  and  clothing.  In  contrast  with  such  grossness, 
the  spirit  of  Hebrew  theology  found  its  highest  expression 
when  the  Psalmist  makes  Jehovah  to  say:  "I  will  take  no 
bullock  out  of  thy  house  nor  he  goat  out  of  thy  folds.  For 
every  beast  of  the  forest  is  mine  and  the  cattle  upon  a  thousand 

hills If  I  were  hungry  I  would  not  tell  thee,  for  the 

world  is  mine  and  the  fullness  thereof.  Will  I  eat  the  flesh  of 
bulls  or  drink  the  blood  of  goats?"  Ps.  1:9-14.  If  God  is 
to  be  worshiped  "with  men's  hands  as  though  he  needed  any- 
thing," revelation  must  declare  it.  Human  reason  cannot 
discover  it.  Our  closest  thought  will  confirm  us  in  the  idea 
that  external  activities  are  not  primarily  God-directed.  The 
ancient  bard  spoke  wisely  when  he  said:  "Can  a  man  be 
profitable  unto  God  as  he  that  is  wise  can  be  profitable  unto 
himself?  ....  is  it  gain  to  him  that  thou  makest  thy  ways 


DUTIES  TO   GOD  189 

perfect?"  Job  22:2-3.  And  again,  "If  thou  be  righteous 
what  givest  thou  Him?  or  what  receiveth  He  of  thy  hand? 
Thy  wickedness  may  hurt  a  man  as  thou  art  and  thy  righteous- 
ness may  profit  the  son  of  man."  Job  36:6-7.  It  is  difficult 
to  make  out  a  clear  case  of  duty  to  God  in  external  conduct, 
except  in  such  action  as  is  helpful  to  our  neighbor.  And  yet, 
emphasize  as  much  as  we  may  a  man's  duties  to  his  fellows, 
they  do  not  exhaust  the  content  of  his  duties  to  God.  For 
though  in  man's  external  activities  we  may  make  a  fruitles, 
search,  the  inner  life  of  the  soul  is  a  field  in  which  we  will  find 
several  very  important  duties  to  God. 

A  little  study  of  some  characteristics  of  our  own  nature 
would  lead  us  to  such  a  conclusion.  There  is  no  indication 
that  the  brute  cares  for  anything  but  the  external  action  of 
those  whose  lives  touch  his.  With  man  it  is  different,  and  the 
higher  we  are  in  the  scale  of  manhood  the  more  importance  we 
attach  to  what  our  neighbor  thinks  of  us  and  how  he  feels 
toward  us.  There  is  one  word  that  perhaps  better  than  any 
other  states  the  essence  of  the  devotement  of  the  devout  soul. 
That  word  is  "attitude."  Would  you  inquire  as  to  the  measure 
in  which  any  man  discharges  his  duties  toward  God,  ask  this: 
"What  is  his  attitude  toward  God?"  The  religious  writers  of 
the  Hebrews  seem  to  have  apprehended  this  fact  and  have 
assumed  it  in  such  texts  as  these:  "Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord 
thy  God."  "Offer  unto  God  thanksgiving."  "The  sacrifices 
of  God  are  a  broken  spirit,"  and  "Walk  humbly  with  thy 
God." 

The  incompleteness  of  philanthropy  considered  as  a  duty  to 
God  will  appear  in  a  glance  at  the  relation  of  fatherhood,  under 
which  figure  not  only  Hebrew  and  Christian,  but  the  best 
pagan  thinkers,  have  spoken  of  the  relation  of  God  to  men. 
No  doubt  every  parent  does  desire  that  his  children  shall  live 
in  peace  and  good  will  with  each  other;  but  do  we  for  one 
moment  suppose  that  the  yearnings  of  the  father  heart  are 
content  with  that  alone?  Imagine  a  father  saying  to  a  son: 
"Now,  John,  the  Jews,  the  Greeks,  the  Romans  and  the  Chinese 
have  said  much  about  the  duties  of  children  to  their  parents. 


IQO  STUDIES  IN  MORAL   SCIENCE 

They  said,  'Honor  thy  father  and  thy  mother,'  but  we  have 
outgrown  all  that.  We  wish  you  to  understand  that  we  need 
from  you  no  outward  service,  and  we  claim  no  inward  deference ; 
all  that  we  desire  of  you  is  that  you  shall  treat  your  brothers 
and  sisters  with  appropriate  consideration  and  affection.  If 
you  will  only  carefully  see  to  it  that  you  do  that,  we  do  not 
care  in  the  least  what  you  think  of  us  or  how  you  feel  toward 
us."  Would  that  be  a  normal  or,  in  any  sense,  an  admirable 
father?  Do  we  worship  a  God  like  that?  A  thousand  times, 
no!  Listen  to  the  voice  of  the  old  prophet  as  he  puts  into  the 
mouth  of  Jehovah  these  words:  "A  son  honoreth  his  father; 
....  If  then  I  be  a  father  where  is  my  honor,  saith  the 
Lord  of  hosts,  unto  you  O  priests  that  despise  my  name?  Your 
eyes  shall  see  and  ye  shall  say  'The  Lord  be  magnified.'" 
Mai.  1:6. 

We  shall  not  claim  to  give  a  complete  enumeration  of  the 
feelings  which  are  involved  in  a  correct  attitude  of  the  soul 
toward  the  Creator.  We  will  consider,  however,  the  three 
named  in  our  classification  of  the  sensibilities  as  Pious  Senti- 
ments. Where  these  three  exist  with  sufficient  intensity  to 
materially  affect  the  man's  conduct,  it  may  be  said  of  that 
man  that  he  "is  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of  God." 

First  among  these  sentiments  is  reverence.  This  is  a 
feeling  difficult  of  definition.  Indeed  we  shall  not  attempt  to 
define  it,  but  shall  try  to  get  a  view  of  its  nature,  by  viewing 
it  in  its  manifestations  toward  beings  earthly  and  human.  It 
differs  from  but  is  akin  to  the  sentiment  of  awe  which  we  feel 
in  the  presence  of  the  grand,  the  stupendous,  the  sublime  in 
nature.  The  poverty  of  the  soul  which  knows  it  not  is  to  be 
pitied.  Reverence  is  awe  plus  something  further.  We  feel 
awe  in  the  presence  of  the  cataract,  the  tornado,  the  earth- 
quake, but  we  do  not  revere  them.  Only  persons  can  be  the 
objects  of  reverence.  In  persons  so  revered  we  idealize  what 
we  conceive  to  be  the  highest  virtues.  We  are  familiar  with 
the  feeling  in  its  exercise  toward  certain  of  our  fellows.  Some 
would  name  it  as  a  common  and  appropriate  sentiment  toward 
our  parents.  Indeed  it  is  appropriate,  and  common  when  we 


DUTIES  TO   GOD  191 

have  come  to  that  appreciation  of  their  virtues  which  only 
mature  years  can  give  us.  Most  persons  experience  the  feeling 
in  some  other  relations.  It  has  been  observed  that  usually  a 
boy's  first  "love  affair"  is  with  a  woman  older  than  himself. 
Often,  too,  there  "is  no  sentiment  of  love  returned."  It  is  a 
mistake  to  call  it  a  "love  affair,"  in  the  common  acceptation 
of  that  term.  Both  the  object  and  the  subject  of  the  experience 
may  be  of  either  sex,  though  it  is  true  that  the  object  of  it  is 
commonly  a  charming  woman  of  about  twenty-five.  A  family 
of  children  who  had  recognized  the  experience  had  coined  a 
word  to  designate  the  objects  of  such  "awe  full"  admiration 
and  were  accustomed  to  ask:  "Who  is  your  Long'y  for?" 
In  more  mature  years  the  same  compound  feeling  of  awe  plus 
idealizing  admiration  manifests  itself  in  our  hero  worship.  It 
sometimes  merits  our  contempt  by  being  lavished  on  a  very 
unworthy  object,  but  the  object  is  always  conceived  as  worthy. 
Humanity  is  the  richer  because  of  the  possibility  of  the  feeling. 
Those  who  have  visited  Mount  Vernon  will  remember  that  it 
was  perfectly  natural  to  remove  one's  hat  as  the  grating  was 
approached  beyond  which  lay  the  remains  of  the  "Father  of  his 
Country."  This  feeling  of  reverence  will  characterize  the 
correct  attitude  of  the  human  soul  toward  that  Unseen  Presence 
—  that  all  pervading,  all  comprehending,  all  enswathing 
Personal  Power  which  we  call  GOD.  Let  it  be  remembered 
that  whatever  of  merit  we  have  thought  we  discerned  in  a 
fellow  mortal  which  called  out  our  reverence,  is  but  the 
feeble  reflection  of  the  same  glory  in  the  Father  of  Spirits. 
"Out  of  Zion  the  perfection  of  beauty  God  hath  shined." 

Religious  teachers  have  sought  to  cultivate  the  sentiment 
of  reverence  by  associating  it  with  particular  buildings,  places, 
and  times.  We  have  no  criticism  of  these  pedagogical  devices, 
if  only  it  is  recognized  that  they  are  pedagogical.  They  may 
accomplish  a  good  purpose.  In  them  there  is  a  condescension 
to  the  capacity  of  the  beings  under  instruction.  In  many 
things  "we  see  through  a  glass  darkly."  In  the  middle  ages 
the  church  sought  to  repress  duels  and  private  warfare  between 
barbarous  chieftains.  The  "Truce  of  God"  seems  to  us  a 


192  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

mockery  of  the  gospel  of  peace.  But  let  us  not  be  too  severe 
on  those  old  monks  and  bishops.  It  was  not  much,  but  it 
was  something  that  those  brutish  men,  steeped  in  lust  and 
avarice  and  boiling  with  revenge,  should  be  induced  to  wait, 
even  a  day,  before  cutting  each  other's  throats.  In  the  clearer 
light  of  our  twentieth  century  civilization  we  are  shocked  at 
the  inconsistency  which  felt  no  twinge  of  conscience  in  shedding 
man's  blood  on  ordinary  days  but  would  not  do  it  on  a  holy 
day.  We  do  well  to  remember  that  this  concession,  inconsistent 
though  it  was,  was  a  stepping  stone  to  a  higher  civilization. 
When  a  boy  has  learned  to  feel  that  God  is  everywhere,  when 
reverence  for  the  Unseen  Presence  has  become  habitual  with 
him,  we  may  dispense  with  Holy  Times,  and  consecrated  places. 
But  so  long  as  he'  thinks  of  God  as  a  large  man  and  fails  to 
comprehend  that  "God  is  a  Spirit,"  so  long  it  will  be  helpful 
for  him  to  acquire  the  habit  of  entering  with  muffled  tread 
and  downcast  eyes  the  place  appointed  for  worship.  We 
would  like  a  better  way  to  train  the  youth,  but  have  not  yet 
heard  of  it,  and  the  number  of  those  in  whom  the  sentiment  of 
reverence  is  weak  and  needs  cultivation  is  so  great,  and  promises 
to  remain  so  large,  that  for  a  long  time  those  who  seek  to  advance 
the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth  are  likely  to  have  use  for  churches 
and  altars  for  stately  ritual  and  for  Sabbath  days. 

The  next  of  the  three  sentiments  to  be  considered  is  Grati- 
tude. This  is  a  friendly  feeling,  evoked  in  the  mind  of  an 
intelligent  being  toward  the  giver  of  a  benefit.  No  one  will 
question  its  being  an  appropriate  feeling  in  the  soul's  attitude 
toward  the  Creator.  We  are  able  to  study  it  as  manifested 
toward  human  benefactors.  It  is  more  than  a  feeling  of  self 
congratulation  over  one's  good  fortune,  though  perhaps  much 
that  passes  as  gratitude  is  not  much  more  than  that.  A 
six-year-old  boy  was  trying  to  explain  to  a  four-year-old  sister 
the  meaning  of  "Thank  you,"  which  they  had  been  instructed 
to  say  on  receiving  a  kindness  from  any  one.  Said  he:  "It 
means,  I'm  glad  I've  got  it.  If  you've  any  more  I'll  take  it." 
Many  adults,  in  practice,  show  no  higher  conception.  Real 
gratitude  acknowledges  my  benefactor,  my  obligation  to  him, 


DUTIES  TO  GOD  193 

and  a  solicitude  for  his  interest.  Most  men  are  susceptible 
to  it  in  their  relations  with  each  other.  To  be  without  it  is 
considered  reprehensible.  To  be  insensible  to  it  marks  a  brutish 
man  anywhere.  There  are  certain  considerations  which 
increase  the  obligation  to  gratitude,  as:  if  the  benefit  is 
unmerited  and  unearned;  if  the  need  has  been  anticipated;  if 
the  benefit  has  been  conferred  unsolicited;  if  the  benevolence 
of  the  benefactor  is  disinterested.  All  of  these  considerations 
combine  to  make  man's  obligation  to  gratitude  to  God  of  the 
most  imperative  character.  For  man's  woeful  failure  in  this 
regard  some  things  may  be  said,  not  as  excusing  but  as  partly 
explaining:  (a)  Many  of  God's  blessings  to  men  are  con- 
ditioned on  efforts  at  appropriation  on  man's  part.  Since  my 
effort  in  planting  and  cultivation  is  a  sine  qua  non,  in  crop 
making,  I  take  all  the  credit  to  myself.  I  forget  the  utter 
futility  of  all  my  efforts  without  God's  natural  agents  with 
which  to  co-operate,  (b)  Men  wake  to  consciousness 
enswathed  in  multiplied  provisions  for  their  well  being. 
Because  they  cannot  remember  when  God's  care  of  them 
began,  they  take  no  account  of  it  at  all.  (c)  Many  of  the 
Creator's  mercies  are  extended  to  all  men  alike.  It  seems 
that  it  would  be  easier  to  be  grateful,  if  I  could  see  myself  a 
special  favorite  of  the  Almighty.  We  fail  to  recognize  his 
goodness  in  blessings  which  he  bestows  on  my  neighbors  as 
well.  And  yet  we  are  taught  to  recognize  it  as  the  glory  of 
Jehovah  that  "He  maketh  his  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil  and  the 
good,  and  sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and  on  the  unjust."  But 
no  one  of  these  things  nor  all  of  them  together  is  sufficient  to 
explain  what  seems  in  so  many  cases  a  complete  absence  of 
grateful  feeling  to  the  Creator.  Nor  is  the  case  made  any 
better  by  adducing,  as  is  sometimes  done,  that  God  is  invisible 
to  the  eyes.  For  in  numberless  cases  of  "hero  worship," 
men  go  wild  in  their  expressions  of  gratitude  to  earthly  bene- 
factors, generals  and  statesmen  whom  they  have  never  seen. 
Indeed  we  are  unable  fully  to  account  for  the  delinquency  in 
question,  except  by  calling  in  the  old  theory  known  in  theology 
as  Depravity.  Call  it  what  you  will  and  account  for  it  as 


194  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

you  may,  men  in  general  are  not  naturally  disposed  to  friendli- 
ness with  God.  They  are  ungrateful  to  him,  because  that  in 
their  inmost  souls  they  do  not  like  God.  Inverting  the  order 
in  some  of  the  phrases  in  Paul's  celebrated  indictment  of 
human  nature,  we  would  say  that  "because  they  did  not  like 
to  acknowledge  God"  they  "became  vain  in  their  imaginations, 
and  their  foolish  heart  was  darkened."  "When  they  knew  God 
they  glorified  him  not  as  God,  neither  were  thankful"  In  this 
connection  we  would  call  attention  to  this  fact:  in  those 
transformations  of  character  sometimes  occurring  among 
men  and  which  are  to  be  as  seriously  considered  by  the  reflect- 
ing man  as  the  cyclone,  the  earthquake  or  the  growing  blade 
—  in  such  transformations  of  character,  gratitude  to  God  is 
one  of  the  earliest  and  most  constant  manifestations. 

The  third  of  these  pious  sentiments  is  Penitence.  We 
believe  that  for  all  men  this  is  an  appropriate  feeling,  because 
that  so  far  as  they  are  known  to  us,  there  are  none  who  have 
not  been  to  some  degree  transgressors  of  Divine  law.  The 
emotion  is  a  complex  one.  Perhaps  the  most  prominent  element 
in  it  is  the  sense  of  self  reproach.  But  it  is  more.  Self  reproach 
follows  our  sense  of  wrong  doing  even  when  our  transgression 
has  been  against  no  one  but  ourselves.  Penitence  is  self 
reproach  with  an  added  sense  of  shame  in  view  of  the  offense 
given  to  a  worthy  intelligent  being.  Perhaps  in  our  own 
experience  we  first  become  aware  of  it  in  our  relation  to  our 
parents.  We  feel  it  when  we  reflect  upon  our  ingratitude  and 
wrong  doing  toward  them.  We  recognize  it  as  the  fitting,  the 
absolutely  necessary  condition  for  the  restoration  of  normal, 
healthy,  friendly  relations  between  parties  who  have  been 
estranged  by  the  wrong  doing  of  one  of  them.  Suppose  that 
in  my  intercourse  with  you  I  have  done  you  an  injustice.  You 
have  felt  it  and  I  know  it.  You  may  have  ever  so  kind  and 
forgiving  a  disposition.  You  may  even  feel  that  you  would 
spare  me  the  humiliation  of  an  apology,  but  I  know  that  I  owe 
it  to  you.  I  will  know  myself  condemned  so  long  as  I  withold 
it.  Perfectly  friendly  relations  cannot  exist  between  us  until 
recognizing  the  turpitude  of  my  offense,  with  shame  I  confess 


DUTIES  TO   GOD  195 

it  and  bring  forth  "fruits  meet  for  repentance."  The  same 
things  are  true  in  regard  to  man's  relation  to  God.  Here  also 
we  expect  the  "fruits  of  repentance"  in  a  renewed  life  —  the 
normal  and  necessary  result  of  Penitence,  which  is  an  inner,  a 
psychic,  experience. 

There  is  a  common  notion  that  the  feeling  of  penitence  is 
one  becoming  "the  contrite  sinner  returning  from  his  ways," 
but  that  after  reconciliation  it  has  no  place  in  the  life  of  the 
devout  man.  We  believe  this  view  to  be  erroneous.  Since 
every  recollection  of  ill-doing  must  be  accompanied  with  regret, 
there  is  something  of  a  feeling  of  penitence  which  will  always 
be  appropriate  to  the  devout  soul. 

The  author  feels  that  this  survey  of  man's  duties  to  God  is 
incomplete.  He  purposely  leaves  it  so.  It  will  be  remem- 
bered that  we  said  that  our  view  of  our  duties  to  God  would 
be  largely  determined  by  what  we  thought  of  God's  character. 
It  was  not  our  purpose  to  set  forth  here  anything  which  might 
not  be  reasonably  maintained  without  an  appeal  to  Christian 
revelation.  We  assumed  the  power,  wisdom,  and  beneficence 
of  Deity.  These  things  are  reasonably  inferred  from  the 
things  we  observe  in  the  "constitution  and  course  of  nature." 
His  power  and  wisdom,  as  another  has  said,  "his  eternal  power 
and  Godhead"  are  "understood  by  the  things  that  are  made." 
His  beneficence  is  shown  in  that  "He  gave  us  fruitful  seasons 
filling  our  hearts  with  joy  and  gladness."  It  will  be  observed 
in  these  discussions  that  when  we  have  quoted  the  Christian 
scriptures,  we  have  not  appealed  to  them  as  authority,  but 
have  used  them  because  they  stated  in  better  terms  than  we 
could  otherwise  command  a  conclusion  at  which  we  had  other- 
wise arrived.  This  much  we  believe  the  thoughtful  man  of 
any  race  or  time  may  find  and  will  find  about  God,  if  he  applies 
his  mind  to  it,  even  without  special  revelation.  And  so  finding 
he  will  be  under  obligation  to  render  unto  God  reverence, 
gratitude,  and  penitence.  But  there  are  those  of  us  who 
believe  that  God  has  supplemented  the  knowledge  which  lay 
within  the  range  of  the  unassisted  human  intelligence  by  an 
authoritative  revelation  of  himself  in  the  person  of  Jesus 


196  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Christ.  If  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  the  revealer  of  God  to  man 
that  he  claimed  to  be;  if,  in  his  mission  here,  God  has  done 
for  men  what  it  is  claimed  that  he  has  done;  if  in  the  life  that 
he  enjoins,  there  are  for  men  the  possibilities  that  he  declares 
there  are;  then,  indeed,  there  are  reasons  for  love  and  trust  that 
surpass  any  that  can  arise  in  the  mind  of  one  under  the  guidance 
of  natural  reason  alone.  Then  indeed  will  God  have  a  claim 
on  the  heart's  supreme  devotion.  In  the  part  of  our  work 
which  follows,  we  will  be  seriously  seeking  the  foundations  of 
our  faith,  asking  in  all  candor  "is  it  true  or  not."  We,  there- 
fore, let  it  suffice  at  this  time  to  have  named  Reverence,  Grati- 
tude, and  Penitence  as  duties  owed  to  God  by  every  man  of 
every  faith  every  where. 


BOOK  III  — MORAL  DYNAMICS 

CHAPTER  I 
THE  GROWTH  OF  THE  IDEAL 

WE  have  now  reached  what  is  perhaps  the  most  important 
division  of  our  subject.  We  denned  Moral  Dynamics  as  that 
department  of  moral  science  which  treats  of  all  the  processes 
and  agencies  by  which  the  actual  life  is  made  to  approach  or 
conform  to  an  ideal.  The  definition  is  not  entirely  satis- 
factory, and  yet  we  do  not  at  present  know  a  better  one.  The 
very  title  tells  the  nature  of  our  theme.  The  moral  life  either 
of  individuals  or  of  societies  reveals  the  existence  of  moral 
energy,  that  is  of  energy  directed  to  moral  ends.  There  is  an 
energy  "that  makes  for  righteousness,"  otherwise  ethical 
history  would  have  no  existence.  Examine  the  attitude 
toward  righteousness  of  the  individual  soul  at  different  times 
and  you  will  probably  discern  differences.  Examine  the 
public  sentiment  of  society,  the  prevailing  moral  standards 
at  different  times  and  you  will  observe  wide  variations.  Some 
things  highly  esteemed  in  one  age  are  scorned  in  another. 
The  very  best  men  of  one  age  will  appear  very  faulty  in  another. 
If  one  of  the  Old  Testament  saints  could  be  raised  from  the 
dead  and  were  to  attempt  to  live  the  life  he  lived  while  in  the 
flesh  before,  he  would  not  be  tolerated  for  a  week  in  one  of 
our  churches.  In  justice  to  his  memory  it  should  be  said  that 
in  all  probability  he  would  not  attempt  to  live  that  kind  of  a 
life  now.* 

*  While  the  author  was  preparing  this  for  the  press  the  Christian  Ad- 
vocate (Nashville)  had  an  editorial  discussion  of  the  probability  that  the 
European  war  then  in  progress  might  be  the  last  great  war;  that  the 
awakened  conscience  of  the  civilized  world  would  abolish  war,  as  in  similar 
crises  it  had  abolished  other  great  wrongs.  Citing  as  an  example  the  over- 
throw of  slavery,  the  editor  says,  "It  seems  almost  unbelievable  that  the 
most  desperate  defense  of  slavery  that  ever  occurred  in  human  history  took 

197 


ig8  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

In  the  study  of  the  changes  which  occur  in  the  moral  con- 
sciousness of  the  individual,  we  are  confronted  with  two  facts: 
(a)  The  earliest  view  we  have  of  a  human  being  reveals  to  us 
no  trace  of  a  moral  nature  at  all.  (b)  The  life  of  every  normal 
human  being  of  mature  years  does  reveal  to  us  activities  which 
we  call  moral  —  a  state  of  soul  involving  what  we  call  moral 
consciousness.  How  then  does  the  purely  unmoral  life  pass 
into  the  moral?  What  causes  the  moral  consciousness  to 
change  level?  There  is  a  metamorphosis  here  as  interesting 
as  any  that  can  be  found  in  any  portion  of  the  animal  kingdom. 
The  child  is  called  a  moral  being  and  properly  so,  but  only 
because  of  the  potentialities  of  his  nature.  For  some  months 
and  sometimes  years,  it  is  difficult  to  discover  activities  of 
any  other  order  than  those  that  belong  to  the  colt  or  the  kitten. 
How  and  by  what  means  is  the  transformation  wrought? 
One  set  of  thinkers  would  make  the  development  to  be  purely 
animal  in  its  origin.  This  theory  is  inadequate.  Perhaps 
there  is  no  better  example  of  the  fallacy  of  "Post  hoc  ergo 
propter  hoc."  First  the  animal  life,  afterward  the  moral 
consciousness,  therefore  the  moral  life  is  but  the  unfolding, 
the  evolution  of  the  animal  or  physical  being.  Just  as  well 
might  these  biologists  argue  that  the  keen  discrimination  of 
the  student  solving  mathematical  problems  is  only  the  evolu- 

place  only  half  a  century  ago  ....  Yesterday  millions  of  intelligent 
men,  many  of  them  good  men,  believed  in  slavery.  To-day  no  one  can  under- 
stand how  such  a  belief  could  have  been  held.  As  it  has  been  with  slavery, 
so  it  will  be  with  war."  No  more  striking  example  could  be  found  of  a 
change  of  level  in  the  moral  perceptions  and  feelings  of  a  great  people. 
In  January,  1865,  the  people  of  the  Southern  states  were  making  one  of  the 
most  titanic,  courageous,  and  devoted  struggles  of  all  history  to  establish  a 
civilization,  the  very  corner  stone  of  which  was  the  right  of  one  man  to 
make  merchandise  of  his  fellow  man.  Fifty  years  later,  while  thousands 
of  the  scarred  veterans  of  that  struggle  are  still  living,  a  Southern  editor, 
writing  for  Southern  readers,  says  of  their  belief  in  that  right  that  "No  one 
can  understand  how  such  a  belief  could  have  been  held."  While  the  past 
fifty  years  shows  the  marked  progress  that  can  be  made  in  the  attitude  of 
men  on  moral  questions,  the  previous  fifty  years  gives  us  a  marked  example 
of  the  terrible  inertia  of  the  moral  nature.  Why  so  much  sacrifice  of  blood 
and  treasure  before  some  men  could  see  and  feel  the  eternal  truth  that  to 
some  other  men  was  plain  enough. 


THE  GROWTH  OF  THE  IDEAL  199 

tion  of  the  appetites.  Others  as  we  have  seen  would  suppose 
a  special  moral  sense,  a  somewhat  superimposed  upon  a  man, 
greatly  to  his  advantage  it  is  true,  but  without  which  he  would 
still  be  man.  To  this  we  have  already  objected  that  it  is  an 
unnecessary  hypothesis.  The  same  psychological  endowment 
that  constitutes  me  a  man  makes  possible  my  becoming  a 
moral  being.  The  development  of  the  moral  life  results  from 
the  exercise  of  two  conspicuously  human  endowments,  the 
reflective  intellect,  and  the  will  in  its  power  of  making  choices. 
Moral  development  proceeds  along  two  lines,  the  growth  of  the 
ideal  and  the  evolution  of  motive. 

Observe  that  the  phrase  "the  ideal"  has  two  shades  of 
meaning:  There  is  the  standard  of  manhood  that  each  one  sets 
for  himself  as  desirable  of  attainment,  that  is  his  ideal.  Again 
the  phrase  denotes  "the  ideal"  the  perfect,  the  standard  of 
manhood  that  we  suppose  might  be  conceived  by  perfect 
intelligence.  Now  the  ideal  manhood  in  all  the  fulness  which 
it  is  destined  to  attain  does  not  suddenly  start  up  before  the 
soul  "like  Minerva  leaping  from  the  brain  of  Jupiter."  We 
observe  in  regard  to  first  ideals  that  they  are  likely  to  be  imper- 
fect in  one  or  more  of  three  respects.  They  comprehend  but  few 
notions,  they  extend  to  one's  relations  to  but  few  persons,  and 
in  their  content  they  are  likely  to  include  some  gross  errors. 
But  even  before  the  first  ideals  are  formed  there  is  usually 
something  done  for  our  candidate  for  morality  in  the  formation 
of  habits  of  action.  These  activities  are  correct  or  incorrect. 
We  cannot  say  how  soon  the  moral  element  enters  into  them, 
but  are  sure  that  there  is  a  considerable  period  in  the  child's 
development  in  which  it  is  entirely  lacking  and  in  which  the 
child  learns  just  as  the  puppy  or  the  kitten  learns  the  tricks 
taught  him.  At  this  stage  there  is  a  large  measure  of  morality 
in  the  aim  of  parent,  teacher,  or  associate,  but  there  is  neither 
virtue  nor  guilt  in  the  conduct  of  the  child.  The  author  once 
knew  a  child  reared  in  a  home  where  there  was  not  a  minute  in 
his  waking  hours  that  his  ears  were  not  saluted  with  profane 
expletives.  He  learned  to  curse  and  to  swear  as  he  learned 
to  ask  for  his  food.  It  was  part  of  his  learning  to  talk.  No 


200  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

one  will  charge  that  his  profanity  was  vicious.  His  elders 
were  verily  guilty,  but  no  guilt  attached  to  him.  Many  will 
be  averse  to  conceding  that  there  is  an  analogous  lack  of  virtue 
in  another  child  learning  to  repeat  "Now  I  lay  me  down  to 
sleep";  but  we  contend  that  as  viciousness  is  lacking  in  the 
one  case,  so  virtue  is  wanting  in  the  other.  Let  no  one  imagine 
that,  therefore,  training  is  unimportant,  and  that  it  is  a  matter 
of  indifference  whether  the  child  learns  to  curse  or  to  say  his 
prayers.  When  the  time  comes  that  this  candidate  for  morality 
forms  ideals,  it  will  be  much  more  easy  to  form  one  which 
coincides  with  prevalent  habits.  It  is  greatly  to  his  advantage 
if  the  dawn  of  moral  consciousness  finds  him  with  habits  of 
thought  and  action  such  as  he  can  continue  to  approve  through 
future  years.  If  any  one  is  disposed  to  think  that  all  ethical 
discrimination  is  hereby  made  simply  a  matter  of  training,  let 
him  remember  that  there  are  many  things  which  we  learn  to 
do,  which  in  fact  we  must  learn  to  do,  before  we  can  give  any 
rational  account  of  why  they  should  be  done.  Nor  is  the 
fact  that  we  have  even  mechanically  learned  to  do  them  any 
obstacle  to  their  inclusion  in  a  scheme  of  rational  activity 
when  the  soul  is  seriously  set  to  that  task.  The  control  of  the 
movements  of  the  body  is  a  case  in  point.  And  in  the  larger 
interest  as  in  this,  the  less  there  is  to  unlearn  the  better.  In 
the  light  of  this  survey  we  can  understand  the  contradictory 
character  of  much  of  the  child's  life.  Much  of  it  is  simply 
mechanical,  and  even  when  moral  consciousness  begins  to 
dawn,  as  has  been  previously  noted,  it  is  like  the  beginning  of 
the  natural  consciousness  of  the  sleeping  infant  who,  startled 
by  some  keen  experience  of  sensation  becomes  for  a  moment 
wondrously  awake,  and  the  next  instant  lapses  into  unconscious 
slumber.  There  are,  and  with  the  human  constitution  as  it  is, 
there  are  sure  to  be  moral  lapses;  the  fewer  the  better.  We  can 
follow  this  analogy  even  farther;  just  as  the  time  comes  when 
our  candidate  for  rationality  will  remain  awake  all  day,  so  our 
candidate  for  morality  is  capable  of  remaining  morally  alert  all 
the  time.  Now  he  is  capable  of  forming  and  choosing  an  ideal, 
incomplete  at  first  but  enlarging  and  improving  as  he  grows. 


THE   GROWTH  OF   THE   IDEAL  201 

Sometimes  the  imperfection  of  an  early  formed  ideal  does 
not  consist  so  much  in  the  presence  of  positive  evil  as  in  the 
distortion  of  a  good,  First  ideals  may  be  caricatures.  Just  as 
the  cartoonist  will  take  some  feature  of  his  subject's  counte- 
nance and  magnify  and  distort  it,  so  the  child  will  elevate 
some  really  good  impulse  or  characteristic  of  one  whom  he 
admires  into  a  place  of  undue  prominence.  The  author  remem- 
bers in  his  childhood  a  large  boy  of  mechanical  ingenuity  but 
dissolute  habits  who  was  an  expert  in  the  making  of  tops  and 
kites  and  most  wonderful  of  all  of  whistles.  How  insignificant 
were  all  the  treasures  of  knowledge  beside  the  accomplish- 
ments of  this  incomparable  mechanical  genius !  How  tyrannical 
seemed  the  parental  restraint  which  aimed  to  limit  his  associa- 
tion with  this  incarnation  of  the  good  which  he  most  appreciated! 
With  what  perverseness  he  refused  to  see  that  this  opposition 
had  any  other  end  than  to  deprive  a  little  boy  of  his  chosen 
delights!  How  he  utterly  refused  to  comprehend  that  this 
opposition  was  not  to  kites  and  tops,  but  to  other  and  less 
material  things  that  he  was  bound  to  absorb  from  association 
with  his  hero! 

There  are  several  conditions  favorable  to  the  growth  of 
one's  ideal:  (a)  An  enlarged  life;  one  which  brings  a  man 
into  relations  with  a  larger  number  of  his  fellows,  to  each  of 
whom  he  has  duties;  an  acquaintance  with  the  world  which 
will  impress  on  a  man's  mind  the  essential  oneness  of  humanity. 
It  has  been  truly  said  that  the  disputes  in  practical  ethics 
have  not  been  so  much  over  the  question:  "How  shall  I  treat  my 
neighbor?"  as  over  that  other  old  question:  "Who  is  my 
neighbor?" 

(b)  Intel?  xtual  development:  We  are  well  aware  that 
there  are  many  examples  of  ignorant  and  simple  minded  people 
revealing  character,  admirable  and  beautiful  in  many  respects. 
All  honor  to  such  people.  They  put  to  shame  many  persons 
of  better  opportunities  but  less  earnest  purpose.  We  will 
find,  however,  that  if  you  make  the  acquaintance  of  these 
persons  they  have  the  conviction  that  they  might  have  been 
better  men  had  they  known  more.  It  cannot  be  questioned 


202  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

that  some  of  the  shocking  incongruities  in  the  ideals  of  some 
people  are  due  to  an  intellectual  inability  to  think  in  large 
terms. 

(c)  Another  and  very  important  condition  for  the  growth 
of  the  ideal  is  that  when  I  have  formed  an  improved  ideal  I 
shall  by  an  act  of  will  make  it  mine.  It  is  not  enough  that  a 
high  ideal  be  assented  to:  not  enough  that  it  has  been  care- 
fully and  laboriously  formed  if  it  is  to  continue  to  exist  only  as 
a  creation  of  the  soul  to  be  admired  in  its  moments  of  reverie. 
We  observed  when  treating  of  the  will  that  we  have  little  con- 
fidence in  a  choice  which  does  not  issue  in  appropriate  action: 
that  choices  are  manifested  and  made  effective  by  external 
actions.  So  in  order  that  an  ideal  which  I  have  created  shall 
at  all  mold  my  character  and  be  itself  further  improved  it  is 
imperative  that  I  shall  make  a  persistent  effort  to  realize  it  in 
the  conduct  of  my  life.  It  is  here  that  the  great  battles  of 
life  occur.  It  requires  no  particular  courage  to  form  an  ideal 
of  the  right  kind  of  a  man.  It  is  not  very  difficult  when  it  is 
formed  to  wish  that  I  were  such  a  man.  Often  it  is  not  difficult 
to  resolve  that  I  will  be  that  kind  of  a  man.  The  battles  are 
fought  when  to  realize  this  ideal  in  actual  life  involves  the 
making  of  choices  against  the  most  energetic  passions.  The 
supremely  critical  moments  in  human  life  are  those  when  the 
question  must  be  decided  whether  in  some  emergency  the  man 
will  conform  his  life  to  his  ideal  or  not.  Jacob  at  Penuel,  Saul 
of  Tarsus  on  the  road  to  Damascus,  Jean  Valjean,  surmounting 
every  obstacle  in  order  to  surrender  himself  to  the  law,-  are 
examples  of  those  who  won.  History,  written  and  unwritten, 
is  strewn  with  the  wrecks  of  those  who  were  "weighed  in  the 
balances  and  found  wanting." 

We  would  warn  our  youth  against  two  errors:  (i)  Do 
not  make  the  mistake  of  choosing  a  low  ideal.  There  are 
those  who  say  that  rather  than  fail  in  the  realization  of  an 
ideal,  it  were  better  to  adopt  one  not  quite  so  high.  Now  it 
is  impossible  to  have  an  ideal  of  character  too  high.  One 
easy  of  realization  is  probably  too  low  to  exert  any  appreciable 
influence  on  character  building.  Not  what  you  actually 


THE  GROWTH  OF  THE  IDEAL  203 

succeed  in  accomplishing,  but  what,  in  thought  and  deed,  you 
perpetually  aspire  to  is  exponential  of  character.  "Not 
failure  but  low  aim  is  crime." 

(2)  Do  not  slip  into  the  error  of  tacitly  assuming  that  the 
ideal  you  now  hold  is  incapable  of  improvement.  Your  ideal 
should  ever  approach  THE  IDEAL.  The  last  term  in 
your  moral  imagery  may  be  like  the  last  term  in  an  infinite 
series.  It  flees  from  you.  When  you  think  you  have  con- 
ceived it,  straightway  you  are  compelled  to  believe  that  there 
is  a  somewhat  beyond.  The  most  blighting  form  of  pessimism 
is  that  which  concludes  that  I  can  be  no  better  man  to-morrow 
than  I  am  to-day. 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MOTIVE 

WHILE  a  man's  ideal  is  growing  and  enlarging,  there  is  another 
change  that  is  going  on  in  every  case  of  healthy  moral  develop- 
ment. Indeed  the  two  changes  are  so  related  and  interde- 
pendent that  the  only  reason  for  considering  them  separately 
is  the  fact  that  they  occur  in  different  fields  of  the  soul's  activity. 
A  man's  ideal  is  an  intellectual  product.  All  changes  in  it, 
however  conditioned,  are  produced  by  intellectual  processes. 
The  change  we  are  now  to  consider  occurs  in  the  field  of  the  sensi- 
bilities. Motives  are  only  desires  made  efficient  by  activities 
of  the  will.  We  have  called  this  change  the  evolution  of 
motive.  The  term  is  not  altogether  satisfactory,  but  we  lack 
any  better  word  to  designate  the  continual  succession  of  higher 
and  higher  motives  in  the  soul's  development.  Let  it  be 
remembered  that  by  it  we  mean  simply  this  succession,  not 
that  one  is  dependent  on  the  previous  one. 

Motives  are  classed  as  high  or  low,  according  to  the  nature 
of  the  good  sought.  They  are  egoistic  or  altruistic  as  the 
good  sought  is  for  myself  or  another.  Egoistic  motives  are 
said  to  be  self-centered;  some  say  selfish.  They  may  be,  but 
not  necessarily  or  always.  A  distinction  should  be  made  be- 
tween self-love  and  selfishness.  Love  is  that  activity  of  the 
sensibility  which  seeks  the  good  of  some  sentient  being.  If 
that  being  is  one's  self,  we  call  it  self  love.  Self-love,  though  of 
lower  rank  than  love  of  others,  is  legitimate.  It  is  a  necessary 
affection  of  the  soul.  No  sane  man  can  seek  or  wish  his  own 
hurt,  conceived  as  such.  He  cannot  do  otherwise  than  seek 
his  own  good.  He  must  love  himself.  Self-love  passes  into 
selfishness  and  a  man's  motives  become  selfish,  when  he  loves 
himself  so  much  that  he  desires  his  own  good  at  the  expense 
of  the  good  of  his  neighbor.  This  is  evil  and  only  evil  con- 

204 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MOTIVE  205 

tinually.  An  appeal  to  self-love  is  legitimate,  because  self- 
centered  motives  even  of  diverse  rank  may  be  wholesome. 
You  may  on  occasion  appeal  to  self-love;  to  selfishness  never. 
Whatever  of  good  to  portions  of  the  race  may  have  resulted, 
incidentally  or  providentially,  from  the  operation  of  selfish 
motives  (and  of  this  there  are  numberless  instances)  to  the 
actors,  there  has  invariably  come  only  poverty  of  character. 
While  recognizing  in  full  measure  the  place  of  self-love,  we 
wish  to  deny  without  any  reservation  that  selfish  motives  have 
any  place  in  the  healthy  development  of  the  human  soul. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  with  most  men  motives  are  mixed. 
Desires  for  more  than  one  good  conspire  to  prompt  the  man  to 
the  same  external  act.  And  yet  according  to  the  character  of 
the  man  one  or  the  other  of  these  motives  will  have  the  chief 
place  in  his  consciousness.  Moral  development  is  marked  by 
the  succession  to  pre-eminence  in  the  soul's  life  of  continually 
higher  and  higher  motives.  A  motive  which  at  one  time  might 
appropriately  hold  the  highest  place  and  be  made  the  subject 
of  appeal  is  noticeably  out  of  place  at  another  stage  of  develop- 
ment. An  incident  falling  under  the  author's  observation 
will  illustrate  this:  There  was  a  lady,  bright  of  eye  and  strong 
of  arm,  a  good  specimen  of  that  type  of  transparently  honest 
womanhood  which  grows  on  western  farms,  who  had  an 
account  at  the  village  store.  One  can  imagine  the  merchant's 
books  showing,  on  such  a  day,  so  many  dozen  eggs  and  so 
many  pounds  of  butter,  on  another  so  many  chickens  and  so 
many  bushels  of  apples;  per  contra  at  sundry  times  so  many 
pounds  of  sugar  and  so  many  yards  of  muslin.  Our  good 
farm  wife,  like  many  of  her  kind,  could  carry  an  account  in 
her  head  and  on  the  day  of  settlement  went  with  cash  in  hand 
to  pay  the  balance  due  the  merchant.  To  her  surprise  his 
books  showed  a  balance  in  her  favor.  With  some  effort  she 
succeeded  in  showing  him  the  error  in  his  book,  and  persuaded 
him  to  accept  the  money  due  him.  She  was  turning  to  leave 
the  store  with  no  thought  of  having  done  anything  particularly 
praiseworthy,  or  even  to  be  remembered,  intent  only  on  getting 
home  to  feed  her  chickens,  when  the  merchant  called  her  to 


206  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

return,  and  before  she  understood  the  purpose  of  her  recall, 
slipped  into  her  hand  a  stick  of  candy.  The  merriment  which 
greeted  the  narration  of  the  incident  in  her  home  was  due  to 
the  incongruity  of  the  incentives  to  right  action,  employed  so 
effectively  in  childhood  with  the  strength  and  maturity  of 
character  of  middle  life.  The  supersession  of  the  lower  by 
worthier  motives  is  the  law  of  normal  development,  even  in 
the  egoistic  or  self  centered  life.  To  see  this,  follow  a  typical 
case  from  childhood  to  what  would  generally  be  esteemed  a 
successful  manhood.  There  was  a  time  in  the  early  childhood 
of  every  one  of  us  when  something  good  to  eat  was  the  highest 
good  we  knew.  No  apology  need  be  made  for  this  fact.  It 
was  the  highest  good  my  mental  development  could  compre- 
hend. I  like  a  good  dinner  yet,  but  I  would  deserve  contempt 
if  the  satisfaction  of  my  appetite  were  the  motive  of  my  life 
now.  Perhaps  one  of  the  next  desires  to  become  prominent  in 
the  child's  life  is  the  love  of  good  clothes.  What  man  who 
remembers  his  first  pair  of  boots  or  pantaloons,  or  what  girl 
with  the  memory  of  the  first  spring  hat  or  parasol,  will  question 
the  force  of  this  new  motive?  Its  entry  into  life  marks  an 
improvement  in  character.  A  love  of  good  clothes,  with  its 
attendant  possibility  of  cultivated  taste,  is  a  higher  motive 
than  the  love  of  candy,  peanuts  and  gumdrops.  A  little  later 
the  mind  of  the  boy  is  stirred  with  the  desire  to  accumulate 
property;  to  own  as  a  security  against  the  needs  of  age,  houses 
and  fields  and  merchandise.  This  too  is  an  advance  on  his 
previous  state.  A  future  satisfaction,  made  possible  by  the 
industry,  prudence  and  self  denial  of  the  present,  is  a  higher 
good  than  any  instant  gratification  of  sense.  We  may  now 
suppose  our  boy  to  have  reached  young  manhood.  He  attends 
a  political  rally.  Senator  Buncomb,  just  from  the  adjournment 
of  Congress,  is  met  at  the  station  by  admiring  thousands, 
escorted  to  the  public  square  to  the  tune  of  "See  the  Conquering 
Hero  Comes,"  says  a  few  commonplace  things,  and  is  once 
more  uproariously  cheered.  Our  boy  goes  home  with  a  new 
impulse  in  his  soul.  Henceforth  the  barnyard,  the  henhouse, 
the  orchard,  and  the  cornfield  are  commonplace  affairs.  Wak- 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MOTIVE  207 

ing  or  sleeping,  before  his  eyes  rise  visions  of  long  rides  on  the 
cars,  assembled  multitudes,  blaring  trumpets,  beating  drums, 
cheering  throngs  and  booming  cannon;  himself  the  observed  of 
all,  the  hero  of  all,  borne  triumphantly  on  —  on  —  on,  toward 
certainly  a  seat  in  the  nation's  Congress,  perhaps  to  the  white 
house  at  the  end  of  Pennsylvania  Avenue.  Here  too  is  a 
higher  motive  than  any  that  have  gone  before,  and  though  he 
is  probably  doomed  to  disappointment  (and  an  honest  friend 
will  tell  him  so)  yet  his  life  will  be  the  larger  for  having  been 
thrilled  with  a  great  purpose.  "A  great  is  better  than  a  little 
aim."  The  confidence  and  approval  of  one's  fellow  citizens  is 
a  good  of  a  higher  order  than  any  we  have  so  far  considered. 
But  all  these  motives  are  self  centered  and  possibly  the  great 
mass  of  men  never  rise  any  higher  than  these.  We  should  not 
conclude  that  higher  motives  have  no  place  in  their  lives,  for 
it  will  be  remembered  that  we  demonstrated  that  altruism  is 
really  a  part  of  the  normal  human  constitution.  But  with 
most  men,  no  motives  higher  than  those  above  indicated 
become  supreme  in  the  life.  In  fact  most  men  are  content  to 
stop  and  to  have  their  friends  whom  they  instruct  stop  at  a 
point  much  below  what  is  attainable.  A  man's  character  is 
properly  measured  not  by  the  aggregate  of  his  motives,  but 
by  the  motive  which  is  supreme  in  his  life.  A  man  is  no  better 
than  his  controlling  purpose.  Returning  to  our  embryo,  would- 
be  statesman,  there  remained  much  to  be  attained.  We  have 
not  supposed  any  altruistic  motive  at  all  manifesting  itself,  and 
even  of  self-centered  motives  the  best  were  not  represented  as 
coming  to  the  front.  Much  of  intellectual  culture  he  will,  no 
doubt,  have  received,  but  of  intellectual  power  as  a  good  in 
itself  he  has  shown  no  conception.  His  mental  discipline  is  a 
means  to  an  end  lower  than  itself.  His  conduct  is  character- 
ized by  a  large  amount  of  generosity,  justice,  and  fair  dealing, 
but  we  have  made  no  supposition  inconsistent  with  the  view 
that  these  things  are  simply  stepping  stones  to  his  political 
ambition.  It  is  perfectly  possible  for  him  to  be  and  do  all 
that  we  have  supposed,  and  yet  have  no  regard  at  all  for  right- 
eousness. He  wishes  to  be  thought  good;  for  aught  we  have 


208  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

supposed,  his  desire  to  be  good  may  hold  a  very  subordinate 
place. 

We  may  now  suppose,  in  the  course  of  his  development, 
that  new  and  higher  motives  enter  into  his  life,  as  love  of  learn- 
ing, patriotism,  reverence  for  God,  love  of  righteousness.  We 
observe:  (i)  This  succession  of  higher  motives  is,  as  we  have 
already  seen,  conditioned  on  the  growth  of  the  ideal.  The  soul 
in  its  development  comes  to  know  a  higher  good  than  it  had 
previously  been  aware  of,  desires  it  and  makes  that  desire 
efficient  by  an  act  of  will.  (2)  The  lower  desires  are  not 
extinguished.  The  man  still  desires  to  eat,  to  dress,  to  acquire 
property.  But  in  their  function  as  motives  these  desires  are 
superseded.  A  higher  purpose  now  rules  the  man  to  which 
these  previous  desires  are  subordinated.  He  "forgets  the 
things  that  are  behind."  (3)  This  subordination  in  conscious- 
ness of  the  lower  desire  to  each  ascending  and  better  one  is  a 
condition  for  the  efficiency  of  the  higher.  Our  embryo  states- 
man must  put  appetite,  love  of  display,  and  avarice  all  behind 
him  to  realize  all  the  good  of  statesmanship.  It  is  this  principle 
to  which  attention  should  be  called.  It  has  not  received  the 
attention  from  ethical  and  religious  writers  which  its  impor- 
tance demands.  ,  The  realization  of  the  ideal  manhood,  cor- 
responding to  any  newly  apprehended  motive,  depends  not 
alone  on  the  fact  that  a  certain  good  is  desired,  or  that  I  am 
in  a  measure  moved  by  that  desire.  Most  important  of  all  is 
the  relative  rank  assigned  to  that  desire  among  my  motives. 
Into  a  man's  life  there  has  come  the  desire  to  accumulate 
property.  His  success  will  be  small  unless  that  desire  moves 
him  with  greater  energy  than  the  satisfaction  of  appetite  or 
the  love  of  display.  Imagine  the  politician  to  whom  political 
success  is  secondary  and  affects  him  less  powerfully  than  his 
love  of  gain.  The  successful  American  politician  is  notoriously 
an  open-handed  man.  He  likes  money  but  he  desires  it  as  a 
means  to  his  political  success.  Reverse  this  process  and  we 
know  the  result.  The  Texas  Congressman  who,  as  the  story 
goes,  lived  on  his  mileage  and  saved  all  his  salary  was  not 
elected  next  term.  In  discussing  this  theme  a  question  arises 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MOTIVE  209 

as  to  a  man's  responsibility  for  his  motives.  The  question 
sometimes  takes  this  form:  What  shall  a  man  do  when  he 
finds  himself  impelled  toward  an  appropriate  act,  by  two 
motives  of  diverse  rank,  and  is  conscious  that  the  lower  appeals 
to  him  with  the  greater  energy?  Manifestly  he  should  not 
forbear  to  do  the  appropriate  act  because  of  the  mixed  character 
of  his  motives.  It  should  be  remembered  that  while  the  sensi- 
bilities solicit  the  will  and  impel  to  action,  the  actions  in  turn 
react  upon  the  sensibilities.  It  is  always  right  to  perform  the 
appropriate  act,  however  faulty  the  motives  that  prompt  the 
doing.  But  let  no  one  take  to  himself  the  credit  of  excellence 
of  motive  where  baser  motives  have  played  a  part. 

There  are  a  few  things  that  the  man  impelled  by  mixed 
motives  may  do  toward  the  cultivation  of  the  right  temper  of 
soul:  (i)  He  can  choose  the  higher  good.  He  can  will  that 
the  desire  for  it  should  be  supreme  in  his  life,  and  he  can  act 
uniformly  in  the  manner  becoming  the  choice  of  the  higher 
good.  (2)  He  can  cultivate  the  higher  motive  by  increasing 
his  knowledge  of  the  particular  form  of  good  which  is  the 
object  of  the  desire  comprehended  in  that  motive.  (3)  He 
may,  in  his  introspection,  be  honest  with  himself.  He  may 
and  should  give  full  play  to  the  feeling  of  humiliation,  which 
must  arise  when  he  recognizes  his  greater  sensibility  to  the 
lower  motive. 

Those  three  things  any  one  may  do,  whatever  his  philosophy 
or  religious  creed.  But  for  most  who  will  read  these  pages, 
somewhat  further  is  possible.  If  a  man  has  accepted  the 
Christian  faith,  he  believes  in  the  possibility  of  the  human  soul 
getting  in  touch  with  the  Infinite;  in  the  possibility  of  a  man 
being  transformed  in  the  renewing  of  his  nature  from  above. 
Such  a  man  may  resolutely  set  about  those  activities  which  are 
of  advantage  in  availing  himself  of  that  aid.  The  prophet 
Isaiah  is  not  the  only  man  who,  not  in  the  slumber  of  the  night, 
but  having  his  eyes  open,  has  had  a  vision  of  the  unapproachable 
holiness  of  Jehovah,  and  at  the  same  time  has  had  revealed  to 
him  the  earthiness,  the  baseness  of  his  own  motives.  More 
than  one  such  man  has  cried:  "Woe  is  me  for  I  am  undone, 


2io  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

for  my  eyes  have  seen  the  king  the  Lord  of  hosts."  More 
than  one  man  has  had  his  lips  touched  "with  the  live  coal  from 
off  the  altar,"  and  has  heard  the  voice  saying:  "Thine  iniquity 
is  taken  away  and  thy  sin  is  purged." 

Possibly  some  reader  may  think  that  this  discussion 
resembles  the  utterances  of  the  pulpit.  Be  it  so.  Had  the 
author  of  this  work  a  pulpit,  these  words  should  be  spoken 
there.  Does  any  one  say:  "This  is  a  hard  saying,  who  can 
bear  it?"  So  well  do  we  know  the  awful  pull  of  these  lower 
goods,  that  we  have  only  compassionate  yearning  for  him. 
But  let  him  make  his  choice  with  his  eyes  open.  Fifty  years 
from  now,  when  the  fires  have  all  burned  out,  leaving  him 
nothing  but  ashes,  let  him  remember  "Thou  hast  had  thy  good 
things"  On  the  other  hand  thousands  of  men  and  women 
will  testify  out  of  a  living  experience  that  no  sorrow  mars  the 
joy,  no  storm  ruffles  the  serene  peace  of  that  soul  who  has  put 
behind  him  every  lower  motive  and  out  of  the  depth  of  a 
sincere  heart  has  said:  "This  one  thing  I  do."  "Wisdom  is 
the  principal  thing,  therefore  get  wisdom,  and  with  all  thy 
getting  get  understanding.  Exalt  her  and  she  shall  promote 
Ikee." 


CHAPTER  III 
EXTRA  MORAL  FORCES  IN  MORAL  DEVELOPMENT 

THE  moral  life  of  most  if  not  all  men  requires  some  helps 
and  props  during  the  stages  of  its  development.  Whatever 
we  may  think  of  some  of  his  inferences,  the  Evolutionist  is 
clearly  right  in  his  observation  of  the  order  of  the  Universe; 
that  order  is  that  "things  shall  come  to  be."  The  moral  life 
is  no  exception  to  this  rule.  Our  moral  experience  is  some- 
what analogous  to  our  learning  to  walk.  We  first  crawl.  It 
is  a  low,  dirty,  beastly  mode  of  locomotion,  but  with  rare 
exceptions  we  must  pass  through  it.  And  there  is  this  promise 
in  it:  there  is  movement.  To  him  who  sees  with  a  prophet's 
vision,  there  is  no  more  thrilling  moment  in  human  life  than 
that  in  which  the  infant  lifts  its  face  out  of  the  dust,  turns  his 
eyes  upward  and  essays  to  rise.  That  movement  differentiates 
him  from  the  creeping  worm,  and  forecasts  his  approach  to  the 
Infinite.  But  how  did  he  rise?  Not  by  any  sudden  upward 
bound,  but  by  climbing  by  a  chair;  and  his  first  erect  move- 
ments are  made  possible  and  aided  by  leaning  on  various 
objects  around  him.  We  need  not  expect  to  find  a  physical 
analogue  for  every  psychical  fact,  but  surely  this  glance  at  the 
child's  experience  in  learning  to  walk  may  fortify  us  against 
surprise,  when  the  moralist  asserts  that  the  first  steps  in  moral 
development  are  made  possible  by  certain  props  and  supports 
from  without.  It  may  be  possible  that  these  extra  moral 
agencies  are  just  adapted  to  our  immature  condition.  A 
crutch  is  a  nuisance  to  a  sound  man,  but  it  may  be  of  great 
service  to  a  cripple.  Unfortunately  most  men  seem  to  be  some- 
what crippled  morally.  They  need,  for  the  time,  some  props 
and  it  were  folly  to  discard  them.  Chief  among  these  extra 
moral  forces  we  would  name:  (i)  The  constitution  of  nature. 
(2)  The  civil  law.  (3)  Public  opinion.  (4)  Religious  faith. 

211 


212  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

We  have  called  these  forces  extra  moral,  because  their 
authority  is  from  without  the  man.  This  is  the  first  thing  to 
be  noted  in  regard  to  them.  One  may  not  always  consider 
this,  but  it  is  a  fact  that  they  all  speak  to  a  man  from  somewhat 
outside  himself.  These  agencies  are  not,  however,  on  this 
account  to  be  considered  anti-moral.  We  have  already  con- 
tended that  they  have  a  very  important  function  in  the  develop- 
ment of  the  correct  life.  Man  knows  things  without  him 
before  he  is  able  to  attentively  consider  things  within.  It  is 
not  strange,  therefore,  that  he  should  know  and  heed  an  author- 
ity outside  himself,  before  he  learns  to  know  and  implicitly 
obey  the  authority  of  his  ideal.  Neither  should  we  be  sur- 
prised to  find  that  there  are  large  numbers  of  men  over  whom 
the  ideal  has  some  power  who  are  either  helped  or  hindered  by 
the  authority  of  these  extra-moral  agencies.  We  say  helped  or 
hindered  for  it  may  come  to  pass  in  this  world  of  confusion 
that  these  forces  may  antagonize  the  authority  of  conscience, 
or  may  antagonize  each  other.  When  all  these  agencies  unite 
to  enforce  the  authority  of  conscience,  a  man  may  not  be 
aware  of  their  influence  over  him.  In  those  cases  where  they 
come  in  collision,  their  force  is  at  once  apparent. 

It  takes  nothing  from  the  imperative  sanction  of  duty  that 
it  is  often  first  learned  and  enforced  by  an  authority  from 
without.  The  same  is  true  of  the  first  learning  of  many  truths 
that  afterwards  shine  in  their  own  light. 

There  are  several  ways  in  which  these  extra  moral  forces 
contribute  to  moral  development:  (i)  A  man  learns  to 'dis- 
criminate in  regard  to  his  activities.  It  is  something  to  learn 
discrimination  at  all.  He  learns  to  direct  his  activities  to  an  end 
and  this  is  an  essential  element  in  moral  action.  (2)  Under 
the  authority  of  these  extra  moral  forces  he  often  acquires 
habits  of  approximately  correct  action,  before  he  is  able  to 
morally  direct  his  action,  and  when  later  he  comes  to  apply  an 
ideal  to  his  life  —  to  direct  his  activities  to  moral  ends,  it  is 
greatly  to  his  advantage  if  he  has  already,  by  any  means, 
formed  correct  habits.  For  example,  we  were  all  taught  that 
we  must  not  steal,  and  learned  to  shrink  from  appropriating  to 


EXTRA  MORAL  FORCES         213 

our  own  use  the  property  of  another  long  before  we  could  at  all 
understand  the  rational  ground  of  the  rights  of  property. 

(3)  These  agencies  may  re-enforce  the  authority  of  con- 
science and  hold  up  as  it  were  a  will  which  was  tottering  under 
the  assaults  of  passion.  It  may  be  argued  (as  indeed  is  implied 
in  some  of  the  things  just  said)  that  on  occasion  these  agencies 
may  be  as  potent  for  evil  as  for  good.  This  is  true.  A  tardily 
working  and  imperfectly  understood  course  of  nature,  a  debased 
public  opinion,  an  unjust  civil  law,  or  a  false,  irrational,  or 
licentious  religion,  may  steal  a  march  on  the  intelligence,  fill 
the  mind  with  untrue  theories  of  morals,  and  establish  vicious 
habits  of  action.  In  view  of  this  truth  we  might  be  discouraged 
as  to  the  utility  of  these  forces  were  it  not  that  we  find  an  analogue 
in  man's  physical  activities.  It  is  doubtful  whether  physiolo- 
gists have  even  yet  correctly  estimated  the  importance  in  our 
physical  development  of  the  primarily  unconscious  and  irrational 
movements  of  childhood.  Very  erroneous  habits  of  action  will 
be  formed,  some  things  will  be  learned  that  have  to  be  unlearned, 
but  the  child  must  learn  to  move  some  way,  before  he  can 
learn  to  move  the  right  way.  The  boy  who  strikes  at  a  ball 
and  misses  it  is  developing  the  power  to  hit  it  the  next  time. 
In  morals,  too,  in  many  cases  of  errors  uncorrected,  or  even 
approved  by  some  of  these  extra  moral  agencies,  there  have 
been  implications  for  the  correction  of  the  error  when  once  the 
intelligence  of  men  was  directed  to  it.  For  example,  as  has 
already  been  remarked,  "The  Truce  of  God"  was  the  veriest 
caricature  on  the  Gospel  of  "good  will  to  men,"  yet  it  did  bring 
home  to  the  minds  of  those  rude  barbarians  the  truth  that  God 
was  displeased  with  a  life  of  violence.  Bishop  Butler  has 
strong  argument  for  his  contention  that  the  "constitution  and 
course  of  nature  (in  which  he  included  both  the  civil  law  and 
public  opinion)  is  more  potent  for  good  than  evil  to  the  man 
who  attentively  considers  it." 


CHAPTER  IV 
EXTRA   MORAL  FORCES  —  CONTINUED 

WE  take  up  in  order  these  extra  moral  agencies  in  the  develop- 
ment of  the  moral  life.  First  as  to  the  constitution  and  course 
of  nature:  It  is  not  contended  that  all  the  child's  adjustments 
to  the  course  of  natural  objects  and  forces  have  a  moral  sig- 
nificance. The  child,  like  the  young  animal,  in  some  things 
learns  prudence  by  what  he  suffers.  Thus  he  learns  that  a 
fall  will  hurt,  and  that  fire  will  burn.  But  when  he  becomes 
capable  of  reflection,  and  intelligently  directs  his  action  for  the 
purpose  of  securing  a  prospective  good,  e.g.,  foregoing  the 
pleasure  of  appetite  for  the  higher  good  of  health,  he  has  passed 
into  a  realm  at  least  bordering  on  the  moral  field.  There  is  a 
difference  in  acts  which  are  determined  by  the  fear  or  hope  of 
near  or  of  remote  consequence.  "A  burned  child  dreads  the 
fire."  So  does  the  kitten  or  the  tiger's  cub.  There  is  no  moral 
quality  in  the  act  of  avoiding  the  flame.  The  consequences  of 
transgression  are  so  swift  and  sure  that  he  cannot  do  otherwise 
than  avoid  it.  The  sensibilities  really  necessitate  the  appro- 
priate conduct.  There  is  no  self-determined  action  at  all. 
There  is  no  moral  quality  in  the  hungry  man  picking  berries  or 
pursuing  the  fleeing  game.  But  put  the  consequences,  either 
pleasurable  or  painful,  ever  so  little  in  the  future  and  you  have 
presented  a  different  problem,  the  solution  of  which  involves 
the  exercise  of  conspicuously  human  faculties.  The  hungry 
savage  and  the  hungry  animal,  picking  up  and  eating  the 
clams  found  on  the  beach  are  not  credited  with  moral  action. 
It  is  a  different  proposition  if,  on  a  hot  July  day,  you  find  the 
man  plowing  corn  that  he  and  his  may  have  bread  to  eat  next 
winter. 

While  wishing  to  hold  them  at  their  true  worth,  we  would 
not  overestimate  material  things  and  forces  as  moral  teachers. 

214 


EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  215 

The  things  taught  are  almost  exclusively  related  to  a  man's 
care  of  his  bodily  life  and  comfort.  And  yet  the  habits  of  self 
control  and  even  of  self  denial,  therein  promoted,  are  serviceable 
in  other  and  higher  fields. 

Civil  law  has  been  defined  as  "a  rule  of  civil  conduct  pre- 
scribed by  the  supreme  power  in  a  state,  commanding  what  is 
right  and  prohibiting  what  is  wrong."  Though  sometimes 
subjected  to  criticism  these  words  of  Blackstone  stand  to-day  as 
the  best  definition  of  the  civil  law  ever  given  and  it  will  be 
hard  to  improve  it.  Several  things  are  suggested  by  this 
definition:  (i)  It  is  a  rule  of  civil  conduct;  that  is  of  conduct 
of  man  in  society,  not  in  isolation.  Observe,  too,  it  has  to  do 
with  conduct — with  external  action.  It  says  nothing  of  the 
feeling  or  temper  which  I  shall  maintain  toward  my  neighbor 
or  toward  God.  (2)  This  rule  of  conduct  is  prescribed  by  the 
supreme  power  of  the  state.  In  despotic  countries  the  truth 
of  this  is  easily  seen.  It  is  no  less  true  in  representative 
republics.  Supreme  power  in  the  latter  resides  in  the  people, 
and  they  do  the  prescribing  through  agents;  the  law  so  passed 
until  superseded  having  all  the  authority  that  any  human 
utterance  can  have.  (3)  The  language  of  the  law  is  in  the 
imperative  mood.  It  commands  and  it  prohibits.  It  says: 
"Thou  shalt"  or  "thou  shalt  not."  (4)  While  imperative  it  is 
not  self  sufficient  or  arbitrary.  There  is  a  reason  for  its  utter- 
ance. Though  like  all  human  judgment  liable  to  error,  it 
assumes  to  measure  its  utterance  by  some  standard.  It  does 
not  simply  command  what  to  do  and  what  to  forbear.  It 
assumes  to  command  what  is  right  and  to  forbid  what  is  wrong. 
(5)  It  is  not  named  in  the  definition  but  it  is  a  well-known  fact 
that  every  legal  pronouncement  carries  with  it  the  declaration 
of  a  penalty  for  its  violation.  It  is  this  which  gives  to  law  its 
wonderful  efficiency  as  a  prop  to  the  moral  nature  of  the  man 
whose  will  is  weak.  We  said  in  a  former  chapter  that  men 
prefer  to  tell  the  truth  rather  than  a  lie,  and  that  the  great 
amount  of  falsehood  in  the  world  was  due  not  so  much  to 
turpitude  as  to  weakness.  A  similar  remark  can  be  made  in 
regard  to  all  evil  doing.  Comparatively  few  men  do  evil  for 


216  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

the  love  of  evil  doing.  Most  men  prefer  to  do  right  when 
there  is  no  promise  of  advantage  in  doing  wrong.  The  trouble 
is  that  their  moral  natures  act  with  such  feeble  energy  that  a 
very  small  incentive  of  appetite,  avarice,  or  lust  of  power, 
will  turn  the  scale.  Now  the  penalty  of  the  law  is  a  counter 
weight  thrown  into  the  scale  of  virtue.  Nor  is  the  man  con- 
templating the  immediate  commission  of  crime  the  only  one 
benefited.  There  are  few  object  lessons  in  morals  like  a 
court  room  where  justice  is  dispensed.  For  that  large  class  of 
persons  who  judge  right  and  wrong  by  immediate  consequences 
it  is  well  that  there  is  a  power  able  to  make  hard  the  way  of 
the  transgressor.  To  many  men  it  is  easier  to  believe  a  thing 
wrong  if  they  see  that  it  gets  them  into  trouble. 

The  power  of  public  opinion  arises  out  of  the  original  and 
instinctive  desire  of  man  for  the  approval  of  his  fellows.  We 
call  this  desire  an  original  and  instinctive  one.  It  is  true  that 
the  infant  may  associate  the  frown  of  parent  or  nurse  with  the 
physical  pain  of  a  blow.  He  may  at  first  associate  the  smile 
with  the  gift  of  some  delicacy  and  so  seem  to  give  us  only  the 
phenomenon  of  the  brute  that  "loves  the  hand  that  feeds 
him."  This  is  because  he  can  comprehend  the  material  good 
before  he  can  understand  the  other.  As  soon  as  he  has  developed 
sufficient  intelligence  to  distinguish  the  approval  from  the  dis- 
approval of  his  fellows,  to  know  when  father,  mother,  brother, 
sister,  teacher,  or  playfellow  are  pleased  and  when  displeased, 
that  soon  does  he  recognize  that  approval  as  a  good  and  that 
displeasure  as  an  evil;  and  this  severed  from  all  relation  to 
physical  consequences.  Apart  from  all  hope  of  reward  or 
fear  of  punishment  he  does  regard  the  approval  of  his  fellow 
as  a  good  to  be  sought  and  his  disapproval  as  an  evil  to  be 
shunned. 

Admitting  that  this  is  not  the  highest  sentiment  of  the  soul, 
we  do  contend  that  it  is  a  worthy  one.  Far  be  it  from  us  to 
say  that  the  approval  of  any  man  or  set  of  men  is  always  to 
be  chosen.  On  the  other  hand  there  are  goods  which  are 
higher;  and  when  presented  in  competition  with  this  must  be 
chosen,  else  the  man  suffers  condemnation  and  moral  degra- 


EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  217 

dation.  We  have  learned  to  honor  that  noble  company  who 
have  said:  "Whether  it  be  right  in  the  sight  of  God  to  hearken 
unto  you  more  than  unto  God,  judge  ye."  The  man  who, 
having  formed  an  ideal  of  manly  character,  adheres  to  it 
through  scorn  and  shame,  preferring  his  own  self  respect  to  the 
approval  of  all  others,  however  mistaken  his  judgment,  wins 
our  admiration.  Hypatia  has  been  immortalized  by  those  who 
detest  her  philosophy.  This  has  been  discussed  at  length, 
because  it  is  important  that  no  mistake  be  made  as  to  the 
place  of  this  sentiment  in  our  moral  development.  We  stated 
that  moral  good  consists  in  the  choice  of  the  higher  of  two 
natural  goods  that  are  presented,  the  one  in  competition  with 
the  other.  When  the  approval  of  any  man  or  of  any  number 
of  men  can  be  secured  only  at  the  sacrifice  of  piety  or  of  self 
respect,  it  must  be  resolutely  trodden  under  foot;  but  when  it 
stands  opposed  to  ease  or  appetite,  or  any  one  of  a  hundred 
personal  conceits,  it  is  the  higher  good  and  must  be  chosen. 
Perhaps  the  most  hopeless  case  to  be  met  in  our  effort  to  lift 
up  fallen  men  is  that  of  the  man  who  says  truly:  "I  do  not 
care  what  people  think  of  me." 

Much  of  the  worth  of  public  opinion  depends  on  the  character 
of  that  public  whose  good  will  and  approval  are  sought.  Yet 
we  would  not  be  of  those  who  love  a  man  "because  of  the 
enemies  he  has  made."  Even  the  good  will  of  the  vilest  of 
men  is  not  to  be  lightly  esteemed  but  is  always  to  be  considered 
a  lower  good  than  the  approval  of  the  good  and  the  true.  It 
has  sometimes  been  questioned  whether  public  opinion  has 
been  more  helpful  or  hurtful  in  the  development  of  society. 
Whatever  we  may  think  of  it  we  can  never  eliminate  its  influence. 
We  can  only  endeavor  to  make  a  public  opinion  which  is  whole- 
some. Observe,  however,  that  the  public  opinion  of  even  the 
most  imperfect  societies  (e.g.,  of  a  gang  of  hoodlums  or  street 
arabs)  always  approves  many  good  things  and  usually  embodies 
some  basic  principles  which,  if  logically  carried  out,  would  go 
far  toward  counteracting  the  evil.  On  the  whole  public  opinion 
has  a  balance  to  its  credit. 


CHAPTER  V 
EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  —  CONTINUED 

Religious  Faith 

THE  effort  has  sometimes  been  made  to  deduce  our  moral  con- 
sciousness from  religious  faith.  It  has  been  affirmed  that  man  is 
first  of  all  a  worshiping  being  —  that  his  belief  in  Deity  is 
intuitive  and  that  from  that  faith  all  his  moral  ideas  are  derived. 
Theologians  have  sometimes  claimed  that  without  religious 
faith  men  would  have  no  moral  ideas  at  all.  We  do  not  think 
that  this  claim  can  be  sustained.  The  question  calls  for  an 
observation  of  facts,  not  for  speculation.  No  necessity  lies 
upon  us  to  relate  the  two  things  to  each  other  as  cause  and 
effect.  We  do  not  believe  that  all  moral  consciousness  can  be 
traced  to  religious  faith,  because  that  in  the  instruction  of 
children  many  concrete  duties  are  taught,  in  some  measure 
comprehended,  and  the  obligation  to  them  felt  before  any 
instruction  about  God  is  given  or  could  be  comprehended. 
But  any  scheme  of  ethics  would  be  very  incomplete  which  did 
not  reckon  with  man's  relations  to  Deity.  Any  survey  of  the 
field  of  moral  Dynamics  will  be  very  faulty  which  does  not 
recognize  religious  faith  as  the  most  potent  of  the  forces 
concerned  in  man's  moral  development. 

The  effect  of  any  man's  religious  faith  on  his  moral  life  is 
largely  dependent  on  the  character  which  that  religious  system 
assigns  to  Deity  and  the  relation  which  the  Deity  is  represented 
as  holding  toward  men.  It  is  important  that  both  these 
conditions  be  observed.  There  is  a  type  of  religious  theory 
which  is  robbed  of  its  moral  effectiveness  by  the  fact  that, 
while  willing  to  concede  all  that  you  desire  as  to  the  character 
of  the  Infinite,  it  proceeds  to  make  of  him  a  hazy  abstraction  so 
far  removed  from  contact  with  and  relation  to  human  affairs 
that  the  conduct  of  men  would  seem  to  be  to  him  a  matter  of 

218 


EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  219 

indifference.  Wherever  religious  faith  has  exerted  any  apprecia- 
ble influence  on  the  lives  of  men,  it  has  been  a  faith  in  a  God 
who  "is  near  and  not  afar  off." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  make  a  comparative  study  of 
the  several  religious  systems.  But  such  an  examination  would 
belong  to  historical  theology  rather  than  to  moral  science. 
Besides,  few  persons  will  raise  any  question  as  to  the  comparative 
merit  of  the  different  religious  systems;  with  most  persons  we 
are  likely  to  meet  the  question  is  Christian  faith  or  no  faith 
at  all. 

We  may  approach  the  study  of  the  Christian  system  from 
either  of  several  points  of  view,  although  there  will  probably 
be  some  repetition  in  our  observations:  (i)  We  may  examine 
the  system  in  itself  —  in  its  essentials  as  to  its  ethical  code 
and  the  motives  to  which  it  appeals.  We  may  inquire  as  to  its 
excellence  or  its  defects,  asking  as  to  its  adaptation  to  the  work 
we  have  in  mind  —  the  promotion  of  righteous  conduct  and 
righteous  character  on  earth.  (2)  We  may  inquire  historically, 
what  have  been  its  results,  absolutely  or  comparatively? 
What  effects  have  been  produced  in  the  several  communities  of 
earth  by  the  teaching  of  the  Christian  faith  to  the  people?  And 
we  may  ask  an  even  more  critical  question:  What  in  general 
has  been  the  effect  on  the  character  of  the  individual  man,  of 
the  acceptance  in  good  faith  of  the  Christian  teaching?  For  by 
this  test  in  the  last  analysis  must  the  system  be  judged.  (3)  In- 
dependent of  any  answer  which  may  be  made  to  any  of  the 
above  queries  we  may  ask,  What  is  the  evidence  on  which  the 
votaries  of  Christianity  seek  to  commend  it  to  thinking  men? 
What  is  the  probability  of  its  truth?  For  no  matter  how  well 
adapted  to  our  purpose,  as  moral  educators,  no  matter  how 
beneficent  its  results,  as  an  honest  man  I  dare  not  teach  it  if  I 
know  it  false,  nor  has  it  any  claim  on  my  acceptance  unless  the 
evidence  in  its  support  is  such  as  would  justify  acceptance  in 
any  other  practical  interest. 

Considering  the  system  in  itself,  we  observe  that  no  one 
questions  the  purity  of  the  moral  code  of  Christianity.  We  do 
not  claim  that  all  its  precepts  are  original  or  peculiar.  We 


220  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

do  claim  for  it  a  completeness  and  purity  not  found  elsewhere. 
Is  it  not  remarkable  that  no  one  attempts  to  improve  on  the 
moral  teachings  of  Jesus  and  his  Apostles?  Even  the  devotees 
of  other  faiths  have  nothing  to  say  against  the  sublime  morality 
of  Jesus.  We  would  lay  as  a  tribute  at  the  feet  of  our  Lord  the 
one  criticism  of  Minister  Wu,  that  Christ's  ideals  are  too  high; 
the  perfect  in  any  line  of  effort  is  too  high  for  the  mediocre. 

But  the  power  of  Christian  faith,  in  the  moral  development 
of  men,  is  not  due  alone  to  the  elevated  character  of  its  ethical 
code.  Fully  as  important  are  the  number  and  character  of 
the  motives  to  which  it  appeals.  While  it  exalts  the  most 
altruistic  and  spiritual  motives,  it  does  not  disdain  to  "con- 
descend to  men  of  low  estate,"  and  within  the  range  of  truth 
to  appeal  to  any  wholesome  motive  which  the  individual  is 
able  to  appreciate.  It  even  claims  that  godliness  has  promise 
"of  the  life  that  now  is."  It  differs  from  both  ancient  and 
modern  stoicism  in  magnifying  human  sympathies.  Although 
Christians  have  sometimes  been  ascetics,  asceticism  is  no  part 
of  Christianity.  It  really  assumes  that  the  good  things  of 
earth  are  made  to  be  enjoyed  by  men.  In  Hebrew  ethics 
(which  Christianity  inherited)  appeal  was  continually  made 
to  the  desire  for  bounteous  harvests.  Yet  we  must  concede 
that  in  this  respect  it  could  not  compete  with  the  philosophy  of 
the  Epicureans  or  the  licentious  latitude  of  Mohammed.* 

*We  need  to  be  careful  here  lest  we  unduly  magnify  the  place  of  earthly 
motives  in  the  Christian  scheme.  "Seek  ye  first  the  kingdom  of  God  and 
his  righteousness  and  all  these  things  shall  be  added  unto  you,"  may  indeed 
inspire  the  inquiring  soul  with  the  proper  hope  that  in  the  service  of  God, 
he  shall  have  "bread  to  eat  and  raiment  to  put  on,"  but  we  observe  that 
here  as  elsewhere,  we  are  taught  the  strict  subordination  of  the  lower  to 
the  higher  motive.  It  is  questionable  whether,  on  the  whole,  Christianity 
has  reaped  more  of  success  or  failure,  from  even  the  legitimate  appeal  to 
the  lower  motives.  What  it  has  gained  in  quantity,  it  has  often  lost  in 
quality.  To  that  reveler  in  wine  and  debauchery,  sick,  penniless  and 
ragged,  loathing  himself,  cursing  society  and  defying  God,  we  may  with 
propriety  present  as  the  sequence  of  a  reformed  life,  a  clean  body,  well 
fed  and  clad,  a  comfortable  home  and  the  esteem  of  his  fellow  men.  These 
are  the  highest  goods  that  his  debased  nature  can  appreciate.  He  would  say 
as  a  certain  labor  leader  is  reported  to  have  said  to  a  clergyman  "If  it's  all 
the  same  to  you,  Dominie,  we'll  take  a  little  less  of  your  heaven,  and  a 
little  more  bread  and  meat."  He  needs  the  bread  and  meat,  and  the  desire 


EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  221 

There  are  other  things  in  Christianity  that  are  calculated 
to  make  its  appeal  to  men  powerful:  (i)  It  teaches  sinful 
men  that  a  holy  Creator  is  displeased  with  their  conduct. 
Unpalatable  as  this  is,  it  strikes  the  ear  from  the  vantage 
ground  of  the  human  conscience.  There  are  few  men  who  are 
not  more  or  less  familiar  with  the  sense  of  guilt:  what  we  have 
termed  the  feeling  of  self  reproach.  The  man  who  condemns 
himself  can  easily  believe  that  a  holy  God  condemns  him. 

(2)  It  teaches  that  it  is  possible  to  have  forgiveness  of 
sins  and  the  restored  favor  of  the  Creator.    Observe  that  we 
are  not  at  this  time  defending  any  of  these  Christian  dogmas. 
We  are  only  calling  attention  to  the  things  in  the  Christian 
system  which  promise  to  make  it  a  very  helpful  prop  in  a  man's 
moral  development.     Whether  these  doctrines  be  true  or  false 
they  are  in  the  Christian  system  and  our  contention  now  is 
that  they  are  adapted  to  rendering  Christian  faith  potent  for 
good. 

(3)  It  confidently  asserts  the  doctrine  of  human  immor- 
tality and  that  a  man's  condition  in  the  future  state  is  dependent 
on  his  behavior  here.     Some  moral  teachers  have  shown  a 
disposition  to  abandon  the  emphasis  which  the  early  disciples 
of  Jesus  laid  on  the  doctrine  of  immortality.     Certainly  if  they 
have  lost  faith  in  it  they  ought  not  to  preach  it,  but  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  the  heroes  of  the  Christian  church  have  been 
strong  because  they  had  a  faith  which  laid  hold  on  two  worlds. 

for  them  is  higher  than  the  desires  which  have  been  dominating  his  life. 
We  may  urge  him  to  "follow  Jesus"  even  for  the  "loaves  and  fishes."  But 
there  is  danger  here.  About  the  tune  our  convert  from  the  slums  is  com- 
fortably fed,  clothed  and  housed,  and  feels  his  life  thrilled  with  a  purpose  to 
become  rich  and  famous,  he  will  find  himself  confronted  with  the  demand 
of  this  new  faith,  that  all  these  motives  which  have  been  so  efficient  in  lift- 
ing him  from  the  gutter,  are  to  be  subordinated  to  a  higher  one.  He  will 
hear  the  stern  command  "Love  not  the  world  neither  the  things  of  the 
world."  The  motives  which  with  religious  faith  came  into  his  life,  lifted 
him  up  and  started  him  on  the  road  of  prosperity  are  now  an  incumbrance, 
and  stand  in  the  way  of  the  satisfaction  of  the  higher  and  heaven  born 
desires.  So  thousands  of  men  have  found  it.  Thus  while  the  spirit  of 
Christianity  does  have  a  place  for  earthly  good,  that  place  is  such  a  subor- 
dinate one  that  we  do  not  believe  very  much,  from  that  point  of  view,  can 
be  said  for  the  dynamics  of  the  system. 


222  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

The  marvelous  power  to  arouse  vicious  men  which  the  preach- 
ing of  the  Gospel  has  at  times  shown,  has  been  due  to  the  fact 
that  in  some  way  it  was  able  to  awaken  in  them  a  conviction  that 
the  consequences  of  either  a  wicked  or  a  righteous  life  reached 
beyond  the  grave. 

Having  examined  the  Christian  system  in  its  essential 
nature  we  next  inquire  historically  whether  the  results  will 
accord  with  our  expectation.  Has  any  considerable  degree  of 
success  attended  the  teaching  of  Christianity  in  the  world? 
Now  success  must  be  both  quantitative  and  qualitative.  No 
matter  how  well  adapted  the  system  may  be  to  develop  right- 
eous character  if  received,  we  would  have  to  discard  it  as  a 
moral  agency  if  in  some  degree  it  did  not  show  propagating 
power;  i.e.,  unless  men  in  reasonable  numbers  can  be  induced 
to  accept  it.  On  the  other  hand,  no  matter  how  great  its  propa- 
gating power;  no  matter  how  successful  in  winning  adherents, 
we  will  have  to  discard  it  unless  it  shows  an  ability  to  improve 
the  lives  of  those  who  accept  it.  Of  our  first  hypothesis  Judaism 
is  an  example.  Hebrew  morality  is  of  a  very  high  order.  In 
the  face  of  a  very  common  prejudice,  we  assert  that  the  Jew 
may  successfully  claim  to  have  compared  favorably  in  morals 
with  the  men  of  any  nation  in  which  he  has  sojourned.  It  is 
said  that  when  Beaconsfield  was  twitted  with  his  Hebrew 
extraction,  he  retorted  that  "a  race  which  though  of  alien 
blood  had  furnished  a  prime  minister  to  Pharaoh,  king  of 
Egypt,  Nebuchadnezzar  of  Babylon,  Cyrus  of  Persia,  and 
Victoria  of  England,  did  not  need  to  apologize  for  itselL"  In 
most  of  those  cases  it  was  the  moral  quality  of  the  Jew  which 
won  for  him  the  consideration  which  he  received.  That  there 
are  Jews  and  Jews  we  freely  admit,  but  contend  that  the  moral 
teaching  of  the  synagogue  is  of  a  high  order.  It  may  fairly  be 
questioned  whether  any  other  faith  can  show 'a  greater  per- 
centage of  men  of  unswerving  integrity.  But  there  is  little 
propagating  power  in  Judaism.  It  trains  the  children  of 
Abraham  but  does  not  win  others  to  its  fold.  On  the  other 
hand  Mohammedanism  is  a  disciple-making  faith.  Perhaps 
no  system  has  ever  shown  greater  success  in  winning  adherents, 


EXTRA  MORAL  AGENCIES  223 

but  when  we  ask  what  it  does  for  them  we  are  disappointed. 
Truly  they  change  their  theology  but  not  their  morals.  We 
should  not  judge  all  Musselmans  by  the  "unspeakable  Turk," 
but  it  is  not  on  record  that  any  people  ever  became  on  the 
whole  in  character  a  better  people  by  embracing  the  faith  of 
the  prophet. 

Turning  now  to  Christianity  we  find  that  it  has  possessed 
the  power  to  commend  itself  to  the  favorable  consideration  of 
large  numbers  of  men.  Beginning  with  a  few  simple-minded 
peasants  in  Judea,  without  wealth  or  political  influence,  in  less 
than  three  hundred  years  it  won  its  way  to  such  esteem  that 
it  was  made  (a  fatal  day)  the  state  religion  of  the  Roman 
empire.  And  when  the  Northern  hordes  swept  down  over 
Gaul  and  Italy,  threatening  to  wipe  out  every  vestige  of  Roman 
civilization  there  was  something  in  the  conquered  Christian 
which  awed  the  conqueror  in'  o  accepting  the  faith  of  the  van- 
quished. Christian  Europe  is  the  answer  to  the  question 
whether  Christianity  has  propagating  power.  As  to  the 
second  requisite  Christianity  has  shown  its  power  ato  raise 
the  hope,  elevate  the  purposes  and  improve  the  lives  of  those 
who  wholeheartedly  and  in  good  faith  receive  it."  The 
cases  of  failure  to  which  we  will  be  cited  will  be  found  due  to 
the  fact  that  the  Christian  faith  has  not  been  received  in  its 
entirety  as  applied  to  the  whole  domain  of  life.  This  apology 
cannot  be  made  for  the  moral  failures  of  other  faiths.  A  man 
can  become  in  name  a  Christian  and  be  no  better  man,  as 
he  can  become  a  Mohammedan  and  be  no  better  man.  But  he 
can  become  a  good  Mohammedan  and  be  all  that  the  system 
of  the  prophet  requires  of  him  and  still  remain  a  cruel  and 
licentious  man  and  an  undesirable  citizen.  But  he  cannot 
become  a  good  Christian,  that  is,  accept  Christianity  in  good 
faith  with  all  its  requisitions  and  implications,  and  remain  a 
bad  man.  In  conversation  with  a  Japanese  convert  about  the 
moral  life  of  his  people,  he  said  "We  have  good  heathen  and 
bad  heathen,  but  a  man  is  always  just  what  he  grows  up  from 
a  child,  the  bad  man  always  stay  bad.  There  is  no  change 
from  bad  to  good.  The  missionary  come,  with  the  Jesus 


224  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

teaching,  and  some  bad  man  become  good  man."  Very 
simply  was  this  told  and  in  broken  English.  The  young  man 
was  really  giving  a  paraphrase  of  the  utterance  of  an  early 
Christian  missionary  when  he  said:  "I  am  not  ashamed  of 
the  Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  for  it  is  the  power  (we  are  in  moral 
Dynamics  now)  —  the  power  of  God  unto  salvation  unto 
every  one  that  believe th."  Under  Christian  teaching  trans- 
formations of  character  are  everywhere  occurring.  The  author 
does  not  know  of  such  events  elsewhere  and  is  persuaded  that 
elsewhere  they  do  not  occur  in  any  considerable  numbers.  It 
is  remarkable  how  the  history  of  the  world  seems  to  verify 
the  words  of  Jesus  when  he  said:  "Whose  soever  sins  ye 
remit  they  are  remitted  unto  them,  and  whose  soever  sins  ye 
retain  they  are  retained"  John  20:23.  There  are  various 
fraternal  orders  that  require  a  high  type  of  character  as  a  con- 
dition of  membership.  They  seek  to  gather  together  companies 
of  men  already  good.  But  we  have  yet  to  learn  of  any  organiza- 
tion of  men  except  those  which  bear  the  name  of  the  Nazarene, 
which  seriously  takes  upon  itself  the  task  of  transforming  bad 
men  into  good  men. 


CHAPTER  VI 

WHY  EXAMINE  THE  EVIDENCES  OF 
CHRISTIANITY? 

DOUBTLESS  some  will  be  surprised  at  our  including  Christian 
Evidences  in  ethical  discussion.  If  our  survey  of  moral  science 
only  took  account  of  character  either  as  it  is,  or  as  it  ought  to 
be,  some  criticism  would  be  in  order.  But  Science  asks  not 
alone  what  things  are  but  also  how  and  by  what  forces  they 
come  to  be.  We  have  proposed  to  consider  not  alone  the  nature 
of  the  ideal  manhood,  but  also  all  those  agencies  and  forces 
which  may  aid  us  in  approaching  the  ideal.  We  have  insisted 
that  moral  dynamics  is  essentially  a  part  of  our  subject.  A 
recent  writer  has  stated  our  case  somewhat  as  follows:  If 
the  naturalist  in  the  prosecution  of  his  studies  were  to  stumble 
upon  some  variety  of  plant  or  animal,  having  every  zone 
for  its  habitat,  exhibiting  well  marked  characteristics,  whether 
under  the  equator  or  the  polar  circle,  of  such  persistent  con- 
tinuity that  from  fossils  it  appeared  to  have  been  the  same  in 
pre-historic  eras;  if,  moreover,  it  were  claimed  that  this  plant 
or  animal  had  exerted  a  powerful  influence  in  the  development 
of  material  civilization;  if  it  were  further  claimed  that  it  had 
in  it  possibilities  of  still  greater  beneficent  influences,  scientific 
societies  both  of  Europe  and  America  would  unite  in  saying 
that  here  was  an  object  worthy  of  the  most  careful  study.  As 
moral  philosophers  we  have  presented  to  us  an  analogous  phe- 
nomenon when  in  our  study  of  the  forces  which  have  helped 
on  the  moral  development  of  men  we  came  upon  the  Christian 
religion.  Observe,  i.  Large  numbers  of  men  and  women  who 
have  been  conspicuous  for  their  attainments  in  virtue  have 
recognized  Christian  faith  as  the  most  important  dynamic  agency 
in  the  improvement  of  their  lives.  Indeed  by  far  the  greater 
number  of  those  of  our  acquaintance  whose  lives  have  shown 

225 


226  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

improvement  in  moral  status  will  be  ready  to  affirm  that 
Christian  faith  has  been  the  most  potent  force  in  their  develop- 
ment. Some  may  think  that  these  persons  are  mistaken,  but 
if  so  their  uniform  conviction  in  the  matter  is  a  fact  to  be 
accounted  for.  2.  The  effect  of  Christian  teaching  on  the  public 
conscience  is  too  well  known  to  be  questioned.  Vices  which 
in  pagan  society  were  openly  flaunted  in  the  face  of  all  mankind 
are  compelled  by  an  enlightened  public  opinion  to  slink  away 
from  the  light.  3.  There  yet  remains  "much  land  to  be 
possessed."  The  great  effects  of  Christian  faith  have  been 
wrought  with  only  a  minority  of  men  accepting  it,  and  these 
applying  it  only  to  a  limited  sphere.  It  has  in  it  the  possibility 
of  much  greater  beneficent  action  if  it  were  applied  to  all  the 
relations  of  life  and  to  all  spheres  of  influence.  So  far  the 
world's  business,  even  that  done  by  Christian  men,  is  only 
partially  Christianized  and  the  proposal  that  the  golden  rule 
should  be  applied  to  politics  and  the  intercourse  of  nations  is 
often  met  with  derision.  4.  The  claim  is  never  seriously 
made  that  Christian  faith  has  hindered  the  moral  development 
either  of  an  individual  or  of  a  community.  The  instances  of 
"the  failure  of  Christianity"  (to  which  we  are  sometimes 
cited)  find  an  easy  explanation  in  the  incompleteness  of  Christian 
faith  rather  than  in  the  excess  of  it. 

It  may  occur  to  some  one  that  if  these  things  are  undis- 
puted no  more  remains  to  be  said.  If  Christianity  is  so  benefi- 
cent in  its  influences,  is  not  that  sufficient  reason  for  accepting 
and  teaching  it?  We  answer:  Not  if  it  is  based  upon  a 
fraud.  Some  one  described  the  state  of  religious  thought 
during  the  Augustan  age  of  Rome  thus:  "To  the  vulgar  all 
religions  are  equally  true,  to  the  philosopher  all  are  equally 
false  and  to  the  statesman  all  are  equally  useful"  But  with 
the  views  of  rectitude  which  we  have  received  we  will  not  be 
at  liberty  to  accept  and  teach,  as  truth,  a  known  falsehood  or 
even  a  half  truth,  because  forsooth  it  may  be  useful.  It  would 
be  bad  morals,  as  well  as  ultimately  bad  policy,  to  treat  our 
fellow  men  as  some  foolish  mothers  have  been  known  to  treat 
their  fretful  children:  "Hush,  be  still  now;  Bogie  man  will 


WHY  EXAMINE  THE  EVIDENCES  227 

catch  you."    No   doubt   that   device  has   been   temporarily 
useful;  but  it  is  a  utility  too  dearly  bought. 

We  received  our  first  religious  views  as  we  did  our  political 
faith,  "by  inheritance  from  our  fathers."  This  is  right.  But 
there  came  a  time  when  we  wished  to  know  for  what  reason 
father  was  a  Republican  or  a  Democrat.  And  it  is  unavoidable 
in  the  development  of  rational  men  and  women  that  there 
should  come  a  time  of  questioning  as  to  their  religious  faith. 
There  is  only  one  rule  known,  whereby  one  may  never  doubt. 
That  rule  is:  "Never  think."  Only  one  way  is  known  to  us 
to  get  out  of  doubt.  That  is  "Keep  on  thinking." 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  NATURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  EVIDENCES 

THE  term  Christianity  is  one  of  varied  import.  In  its  most 
comprehensive  significance  it  stands  for  that  body  of  moral 
and  religious  doctrine  which  is  found  in  the  life  and  teaching  of 
Jesus  of  Nazareth.  "Christian  Evidences"  is  not  a  study  of 
the  beauties  of  the  Christian  code  of  ethics.  Sublime  moral 
maxims  like  the  Golden  Rule  and  the  Beatitudes  commend 
themselves  to  the  judgment  of  mankind  on  their  own  merits. 
If  their  author  were  even  proven  an  impostor  they  would  still 
shine  in  their  own  light.  They  would  still  commend  themselves 
to  us  as  the  best  expressions  of  human  duty  that  philosophy 
had  ever  formulated.  But  they  would  lack  the  authority  of 
divine  command  which  has  been  attributed  to  them  and  which 
in  the  past  has  been  so  effective  in  the  effort  to  press  them 
upon  the  human  conscience. 

Christianity  has  embodied  in  it  a  number  of  doctrines  as  to 
the  nature  and  attributes  of  Deity.  This  is  Christian  Theology. 
It  is  no  part  of  "Christian  Evidences"  to  consider  the  reasonable- 
ness or  otherwise  of  Christian  Theology.  But  Christianity  in- 
cludes a  body  of  doctrine  in  regard  to  the  nature  and  life  history 
of  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  The  disciples  of  Jesus  claim  that  in  the 
person  of  this  Jesus  a  supernatural  being  came  to  earth  and 
submitted  Himself  to  the  common  experiences  of  the  race. 
Indeed  they  assert  that  He  claimed  this  for  Himself.  They 
further  claim  that  on  the  conditions  which  He  prescribes  "men 
may  have  the  forgiveness  of  their  sins,  the  transformation  of 
their  character,  the  continuing  presence  of  a  Divine  Com- 
forter and  a  pleasant  assurance  of  immortality  and  happiness 
after  death."  These  are  stupendous  claims  and  their  sub- 
stantiation will  require  stupendous  proofs.  Such  proofs  the 
first  disciples  of  Jesus  are  represented  as  claiming  that  He 

228 


THE  NATURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  EVIDENCES     229 

furnished.  They  assert  that  this  Jesus  in  the  light  of  day  and 
before  the  eyes  of  the  multitude,  wrought  many  wonderful 
works  which  showed  Him  to  have  the  "forces  of  Nature  in  the 
grip  of  His  will."  They  further  assert  that  finally  having  been 
put  to  death  and  buried,  on  the  third  day  He  walked  out  of  the 
tomb,  and  at  sundry  times,  for  the  space  of  forty  days,  showed 
Himself  to  them  alive.  And  that  at  the  end  of  that  time 
having  given  them  commandment  to  teach  and  to  make  disciples 
of  all  nations,  a  cloud  received  Him  out  of  their  sight  and  they 
saw  Him  no  more.  Now  the  study  of  Christian  Evidences  is 
a  study  of  the  credibility  of  these  claims.  It  seeks  to  answer 
this  question:  Are  the  things  claimed  for  Him  sufficiently 
well  attested  to  warrant  reasonable  men  to-day  in  accepting 
Jesus  of  Nazareth  as  the  authoritative  revelation  of  God  to 
man?  It  aims  to  do  this  much  and  no  more.  The  author 
deems  it  so  important  that  the  question  of  the  excellence  of 
Christian  teaching  and  ethics  be  separated  from  the  question 
of  its  authority,  that  he  adds  a  homely  illustration  from  his 
childhood's  experience.  We  were  a  group  of  schoolboys  in  the 
woods  in  Ohio.  The  noon  hour  was  always  too  short  for  our 
purposes;  the  signal  for  the  resumption  of  our  tasks  was  the 
teacher's  tapping  with  his  penknife  on  the  window  pane. 
Accidentally,  at  first,  we  found  certain  advantages  (from  our 
point  of  view)  accruing  to  us  in  wandering  too  far  from  the 
schoolhouse  to  hear  the  signal.  What  a  surprised  air  we 
assumed  when,  at  the  middle  of  the  afternoon,  we  returned 
weary  with  play.  How  well  the  excuse  "We  did  not  hear  you 
rap"  served  to  save  us  from  the  penalties  of  truancy.  We 
worked  it  "for  all  it  was  worth,"  and  for  several  days  "worked 
the  teacher"  finely.  There  came  a  day  when  we  were  surprised 
by  the  appearance  of  a  towheaded  urchin  with  this  ominous 
message:  "Books  is  called  and  teacher  says  for  you  boys  to 
come  right  along  in."  Some  were  incredulous  and  subjected 
the  boy  to  a  grueling  cross-examination.  Mark  you,  there 
was  no  question  in  our  minds  as  to  what  we  ought  to  do,  indeed 
as  to  what  we  ought  to  have  done  an  hour  before.  The  one 
question  that  we  thought  it  worth  while  to  consider  was: 


230  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Did  the  teacher  really  send  that  boy?  Was  his  message 
authoritative?  That  urchin  with  his  message  and  our  reception 
of  it  is  in  some  respects  a  homely  but  fitting  analogue  to  the 
relation  of  the  message  of  Jesus  Christ  to  men  in  the  larger 
interest.  That  boy  (if  we  believed  him)  brought  to  bear  on 
our  feeble  desire  for  learning  and  regard  for  duty  the  added 
motive  of  regard  for  the  teacher's  favor,  and  a  wholesome  fear 
of  his  displeasure.  It  was  a  prop  to  a  feeble  will.  Christian 
faith  brings  to  bear  on  weak  and  vacillating  human  nature  the 
added  motive  of  regard  for  the  Divine  approval.  In  each  case 
the  question  is  not  asked  as  to  what  duty  may  be.  In  each 
case  duty  is  sufficiently  well  known.  But  in  each  case  some 
one  asks  and  must  be  answered,  als  this  message  credible?" 
"Does  this  messenger  speak  with  authority?"  We  asked: 
"Did  the  boy  really  come  from  the  teacher?"  In  the  larger 
interest,  hesitating,  doubting,  pleasure-loving  men  and  women 
before  committing  themselves  to  Him  are  asking:  "Was 
Jesus  of  Nazareth  really  in  fact  a  messenger  sent  from  God?" 
And  you  and  I  must  produce  the  reasons  for  our  faith. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

HOW    COULD    A    DIVINE    REVELATION,  IF    MADE, 
BE  ACCREDITED? 

PRELIMINARY  to  the  discussion  of  this  question  it  is  in  order 
to  ask  as  to  the  probability  of  any  special  revelation  being 
made  at  all.  Little  time  may  be  spent  with  those  who  dog- 
matically assert  that  such  a  revelation  is  an  impossibility. 
Many  have  thought  it  very  improbable.  Few  have  had  the 
audacity  to  say  that  it  was  an  impossibility  to  the  Most  High. 
Now  if  it  is  conceded  that  it  is  possible  for  God  to  reveal  his 
will  to  men,  the  only  practical  question  is  as  to  the  wisdom  of 
His  doing  so.  If  it  should  appear  to  us  that  it  would  be  wise, 
we  are  then  prepared  to  deal  with  it  as  a  probable  event,  and 
to  view  a  purported  revelation  as  a  matter  capable  of  being 
proven  by  evidence  appropriate  to  the  proof  thereof. 

We  are  under  the  necessity  of  believing  that  God  had  some 
end  in  view  in  the  creation  of  the  human  race.  It  surely 
would  be  no  part  of  wisdom  to  leave  such  a  being  as  man 
without  knowledge  as  to  what  he  might  do  to  realize  the  end 
of  his  being.  Indeed  it  is  possible  to  view  this  question  in 
such  a  light  that  the  marvel  will  be,  not  that  God  has  revealed 
Himself  at  all,  but  that  He  has  done  so  so  seldom.  There  is 
something  attractive  in  the  doctrine  of  the  poet's  song  that — 

....   in  all  ages, 

Every  human  heart  is  human, 

That  in  even  savage  bosoms 

There  are  longings,  yearnings,  strivings, 

For  the  good  they  comprehend  not. 

That  the  feeble  hands  and  helpless, 

Groping  blindly  in  the  darkness, 

Touch  God's  right  hand  in  that  darkness, 

And  are  lifted  up  and  strengthened. 

But  while  this  thought  is  very  pleasing  we  must  confess 
that  as  a  matter  of  fact  this  "groping  blindly  in  the  darkness" 

231 


232  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

each  for  himself  is  very  unsatisfactory  and  very  barren  of 
results.  Even  if  the  supposed  revelation  in  Christianity  is 
after  all  only  a  "will  o'  the  wisp,"  it  remains  a  fact  that  in 
it  every  year  more  men  are  finding  their  way  to  a  life  of  virtue 
than  are  known  to  have  done  so  in  all  climes  and  ages  by  this 
" groping"  spoken  of  so  admiringly.  So  we  may  say  that  if 
Christianity  is  not  true  it  ought  to  have  been.  Some  one  may 
say  (erroneously  we  think)  that  the  goodness  of  the  Creator 
pledges  him  to  have  done  more.  Few  if  any  will  contend  that 
this  old  world  did  not  need  so  much. 

Now  if  a  revelation  is  to  be  made,  it  is  evidently  of  impor- 
tance that  there  be  some  way  of  accrediting  it.  The  mere 
claim  of  some  man  to  speak  as  the  vicegerent  of  the  Most 
High  is  not  sufficient.  All  will  agree  that  the  world  has  had 
more  than  enough  of  such  frauds.  No  one  is  bound  to  listen 
to  every  fellow  mortal  who  comes  to  him  saying:  "I  have  a 
message  from  God  to  thee."  In  the  absence  of  convincing 
proof  it  is  certainly  in  order  to  retort:  "Which  way  went  the 
Spirit  of  the  Lord  from  me  to  speak  to  thee?"  What  sort  of 
proof  will  be  appropriate  and  convincing?  You  remember 
that  only  Ulysses  could  bend  the  bow  of  Ulysses.  There  are 
things  that  no  one  less  than  God  can  do.  He  who  assumes  to 
come  to  me  with  a  divine  message,  claims  the  wisdom  of  God. 
He  need  not  be  surprised  that  I  demand  that  he  show  me  the 
power  of  God.  If  he  represent  the  Author  of  nature,  is  it 
unreasonable  that  I  ask  him  to  show  his  commission  in  author- 
ity over  nature?  A  miracle  is  properly  defined  as  "an  extraor- 
dinary event,  wrought  in  attestation  of  a  divine  message,  of 
such  a  character  as  to  manifestly  imply  that  is  was  effected 
by  the  immediate  and  special  volition  of  Deity."  We  believe 
that  God  is  as  truly  in  the  ordinary  course  of  nature  as  in  the 
extraordinary  event;  but  that  which  is  frequently  and  uni- 
formly occurring  lacks  convincing  evidential  value  in  a  special 
case.  It  is  necessary  to  this  end  that  the  power  which  is  over 
nature  shall  reveal  itself  in  some  supersession  of  the  usual 
order.  Instead  of  apologizing  for  our  belief  in  miracles  we 
would  maintain  that  a  miracle  of  some  sort  is  the  appropriate, 


DIVINE  REVELATION— HOW  ACCREDITED?  233 

and  so  far  as  we  can  see,  the  only  appropriate  method  of  accred- 
iting a  divine  message.  We  have  found  many  who  would 
dissent  from  this  but  have  found  no  one  who  would  presume 
that  he  could  inform  the  Most  High  of  a  better  way. 

It  may  be  objected  that  this  view  of  the  case  would  neces- 
sitate the  working  of  miracles  in  every  age  and  before  the  eyes 
of  every  man.  This  would  be  true  but  for  one  thing,  and 
that  circumstance  is  fatal  to  the  objection.  The  fact  is  this: 
human  nature  is  so  constituted  that  it  is  capable  of  receiving 
human  testimony  and  of  being  convinced  thereby.  No  one 
proposes,  even  in  the  most  weighty  matters,  to  limit  the  sphere 
of  his  certainty  to  the  horizon  or  his  experience.  Not  only  are 
men  capable  of  being  convinced  by  testimony  as  to  matters 
of  fact,  but  there  may  be  testimony  of  sufficient  strength  to 
compel  belief  in  any  mind  not  already  committed  to  unbelief. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE    PROPER    TEMPER    OF    MIND    IN   WHICH   TO 
EXAMINE  CHRISTIAN  EVIDENCES 

IN  some  minds  there  lurks  a  suspicion  that  because  of  lonj 
cherished  opinions  Christian  men  are  unable  to  properly 
weigh  the  evidence  for  and  against  the  truth  of  Christianity. 
That  we  approach  the  study  with  a  decided  bias  toward  the 
faith  of  our  fathers  may  be  frankly  conceded.  But  that  such 
bias  may  not  hinder  a  fair  consideration  of  the  evidence  and 
need  not  preclude  our  perception  of  the  truth  may  reasonably 
be  inferred  when  we  observe  that  a  very  different  principle 
has  been  announced  in  regard  to  some  other  lines  of  investiga- 
tion. A  few  years  since  some  one  in  discussing  the  work  of 
some  scientific  experts  set  forth  in  effect  the  idea  that  no  man  is 
qualified  to  pass  judgment  on  the  conclusions  of  modern 
science,  unless  he  is  himself  a  scientist.  Had  any  one  said 
that  no  man  was  capable  of  passing  judgment  on  the  evidences 
of  the  truth  of  Christianity  unless  he  were  himself  a  Christian, 
it  would  have  been  thought  the  utterance  of  religious  bigotry. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  each  statement  is  erroneous,  and  yet  each 
is  simply  an  over  statement  of  a  truth.  It  is  not  true  that  a 
man  must  be  committed  to  any  scientific  theory  in  order  to 
judge  of  its  correctness.  It  is  true  that  he  must  have  the 
scientific  spirit.  He  must  be  in  sympathy  with  the  general 
spirit  of  scientific  investigation.  Lacking  that  spirit  the  data 
of  science  will  not  press  upon  him  with  the  weight  to  which 
they  are  entitled.  Likewise,  it  is  not  true  that  a  man  must  be 
committed  to  Christianity  in  order  to  judge  of  its  evidences, 
but  he  should  be  in  sympathy  with  its  ends  and  purposes  —  a 
man  who  in  his  inmost  soul  does  desire  to  be  a  righteous  man 
and  desires  the  triumph  of  righteousness  in  the  earth.  His 

234 


PROPER  TEMPER  OF  MIND  235 

attitude  is  not  necessarily  one  of  indifference.  In  many 
things  we  are  in  accord  with  that  man  of  science  who  said: 
"What  care  I  what  the  truth  may  be,  so  only  it  is  the  truth?" 
and  yet  there  are  scientific  questions  in  the  investigation  of 
which  such  an  attitude  would  be  unbecoming;  e.g.,  some 
years  since  there  was  some  discussion  as  to  whether  the  world 
were  rapidly  drying  up.  Streams  anc1  lakes  were  measured 
and  rainfall  carefully  observed.  Men  were  determined  to 
know  the  truth  and  to  accept  it  whatever  it  might  be,  but  who 
will  believe  that  any  man  interested  in  the  investigation  was 
without  care  as  to  the  result.  True  his  desire  for  a  beneficent 
finding  might  be  a  somewhat  vitiating  element  but  we  believe 
that  it  was  less  so  than  the  morbid  temper  of  the  man  who 
wrote  a  work  of  fiction  in  which  he  fairly  gloated  over  the 
desolation  of  the  earth  as  one  after  another  of  our  lakes  and 
rivers  are  dried  up,  a  dying  population,  following  a  receding 
sea  until  finally  the  last  man  perishes  with  the  failure  of  a 
little  pool  in  what  had  been  the  ocean's  deepest  bed.  We  do 
not  believe  that  the  Christian's  optimism  is  so  great  a  hindrance 
to  a  correct  judgment  as  is  the  despair  of  the  man  who  sees  no 
star  of  hope  in  earth's  dark  night.  Further  we  may  freely 
admit  that  faith  in  Christianity  may  bias  one's  judgment  in 
its  favor  while  weighing  its  evidences,  but  it  is  equally  clear 
that  disbelief  or  dislike  of  Christianity  will  be  fully  as  potent 
in  giving  a  bias  of  judgment  against  it.  We  assert  without 
fear  of  successful  contradiction  that  the  theoretically  unpreju- 
diced juror  for  weighing  the  evidences  of  Christianity  cannot 
be  found  on  this  earth.  We  have  conceded  and  all  will  agree 
that  the  Christian  devotee  is  prejudiced  in  its  favor.  It  is 
equally  clear  though  not  so  frequently  noted  that  the  non- 
Christian  is  prejudiced  against  it.  There  is  a  sharp  polarity 
about  the  Christian  system,  compelling  men  to  range  them- 
selves in  opposing  camps.  Even  though  a  man  is  not  an 
adherent  of  a  rival  religious  system  the  very  nature  of  the 
Christian  teaching  is  such  as  to  arouse  his  antagonism  unless 
he  is  persuaded  to  accept  it.  His  pride  is  wounded  by  the 
fact  that  Christianity  assumes  as  a  basal  fact  that  which  his 


236  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

guilty  conscience  has  ever  and  anon  been  thrusting  upon  him 
—  "  You  are  a  guilty  sinner." 

What  shall  we  then  do?  Who  shall  weigh  and  pass  judg- 
ment on  these  evidences?  We  answer:  Everyone.  That  the 
Christian  is  not  an  indifferent  or  thoroughly  unprejudiced 
juror,  we  frankly  concede.  But  he  is  as  competent  as  any  one 
we  can  find  and  he  must  sit  on  the  jury.  Fortunately  for  our 
hopes  of  fair  judgment  many  men  in  regard  to  other  interests 
have  been  in  like  situations.  It  may  be  shown  that  a  very 
earnest  hope  as  to  what  may  be  found  to  be  true  is  not  always 
inconsistent  with  a  grim  determination  to  know  the  truth  at 
any  cost.  For  example,  it  has  been  hinted  to  you  that  a  mortal 
disease  has  fastened  itself  upon  you.  You  certainly  hope 
that  it  is  not  true,  but  you  will  consult  a  physician.  You  do 
not  search  for  a  stranger  who  does  "not  care  what  the  truth 
may  be."  It  never  occurs  to  you  that  the  friendly  interest  of 
your  lifelong,  tried  and  tested  family  physician  will  at  all 
incapacitate  him  for  giving  a  thorough  and  honest  examination 
and  a  correct  diagnosis.  We  who  are  Christians  would  be 
equally  honest  and  rational  here.  We  examine  the  evidences 
of  the  truth  of  the  Christian  faith,  hoping,  indeed,  that  it 
may  be  found  true.  But  whatever  the  truth  may  be  we  will 
know  it.  This  is  the  mental  attitude  in  which  one  should  be 
for  the  study  of  Christian  Evidences. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  KIND  AND  DEGREE  OF  PROOF  WE  MAY  EXPECT 
IN  EVIDENCES  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

WE  speak  of  proof  properly  so  called.  There  are  persuasions 
as  to  truth  that  are  obtained  by  acts  of  direct  perception. 
Where  possible  they  may  be  better  than  proof,  but  they  should 
not  be  called  by  that  name.  You  desire  to  know  whether  a 
given  solution  is  sweet  or  sour,  whether  a  certain  fabric  is 
green  or  red,  whether  certain  sounds  will  blend  harmoniously. 
You  do  not  adduce  anything  in  proof.  You  simply  taste,  you 
look,  you  listen,  and  you  know.  Some  insist  on  the  applica- 
tion of  this  method  to  Christianity.  Evangelists  never  weary 
of  exhorting  men  to  prove  the  truth  of  Christianity  by  trying 
it.  They  are  right.  Most  of  those  whom  they  address  are  in 
an  attitude  such  that  they  can  try  it.  There  are  thousands 
of  men  and  women  who  in  the  inner  life  have  had  an  experience 
which  wrought  a  confirmation  of  the  truth  which  far  transcends 
anything  that  we  may  hope  to  accomplish  by  logical  argument. 

You  ask  me,  brethren,  how  I  know 

That  Jesus  is  divine; 

The  rather  bid  me  tell  you  how  I  know 

That  yonder  sun  doth  shine; 

The  rather  bid  me  tell  you  how  I  know  that  billows  roll, 

Or  winds  sweep  on  from  north  to  south, 

Why,  friends  He  saved  my  soul. 

But  this  experience  is  possible  only  on  certain  conditions  of 
soul  that  cannot  be  commanded  at  will.  It  will  be  found  too 
that  it  presupposes  such  a  conviction  in  the  man's  mind  of 
the  truth  of  Jesus  Christ  that  the  man  was  able  to  risk  his  all 
upon  him.  This  is  what  the  personal  workers  mean  when 
they  exhort  the  man  to  "trust  in  Jesus."  No  one  can  do 
that  while  his  mind  is  torn  by  questioning  whether  or  not  Jesus 
may  be  a  myth  and  the  Christian's  hope  a  delusion.  In 

237 


238  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

making  this  revelation  God  has  shown  a  great  respect  for 
human  intelligence  by  furnishing  many  "infallible  proofs," 
and  we  admit  that  the  unbeliever  or  the  devotee  of  another 
system  has  a  right  to  demand  of  us  as  disciples  of  Jesus  that 
we  produce  "our  reasons  for  the  hope  that  is  in  us."  He  has 
a  right  to  demand  of  us  that  we  show  the  system  to  be  probably 
true  before  we  ask  him  to  risk  wealth,  fame  or  pleasure  or  as 
many  have  done,  life  itself  in  accepting  it. 

Now  there  are  two  kinds  of  evidence  or  proof:  the  demon- 
strative, and  the  moral.  Mathematics  furnishes  the  best 
examples  of  the  former,  natural  and  historical  science  are  full 
of  examples  of  the  latter.  The  two  differ  in  the  nature  of  the 
conviction  which  is  wrought  in  the  human  mind.  In  the 
mathematical  demonstration  the  inference  is  a  necessary  one. 
The  premises  being  given,  the  mind  has  no  alternative,  but 
must  accept  the  conclusion.  In  a  chain  of  such  reasoning, 
nothing  is  conclusive  until  you  reach  a  certain  clinching  point, 
and  then  it  is  done.  There  is  no  proof  at  all  until  it  is  com- 
pleted and  then  there  can  be  no  controversy.  All  doubt  and 
questioning  are  forever  at  rest.  All  such  conclusions  are  of 
equal  certainty.  But  every  one  must  know  that  there  are 
few  practical  affairs  to  which  this  method  of  proof  is  possible. 
In  business,  in  politics,  in  industry  of  every  kind  men  seek  in 
vain  for  demonstration.  One  bases  all  his  action  on  the  prob- 
able. The  most  that  can  be  said  of  the  contingencies  on  which 
he  risks  fortune  and  life  itself  is  that  they  are  very  probable. 
When  we  undertake  to  argue  from  the  some  of  the  past  to  the 
all  of  the  present  or  future,  we  have  a  syllogism  with  a  particular 
sumption  from  which  no  conclusion  can  be  drawn.  Con- 
clusions based  on  an  induction  can  never  be  absolutely  and 
necessarily  certain,  for,  as  one  has  said,  "they  can  never  be 
quite  purged  from  the  uncertainty  of  the  major  premise." 
Have  we  then  any  rational  ground  for  action  following  such 
reasoning?  Yes.  Arguments  based  on  carefully  made  induc- 
tions work  in  the  mind  every  degree  of  persuasion  of  truth 
from  the  faintest  apprehension  to  a  conviction  of  certainty, 
such  as  we  have  in  the  return  of  the  seasons,  or  like  our  con- 


THE  DEGREE  OF  PROOF  239 

fidence  in  a  long-tried  friend.  The  man  who  would  refuse  to 
act  in  the  most  serious  affairs  on  a  carefully  guarded  induction, 
insisting  on  demonstration,  might  well  be  thought  insane.  It 
is  folly  to  insist  on  demonstration  in  those  matters  which 
only  admit  of  inductive  conclusions. 

The  "Evidences  of  Christianity"  is  an  inductive  study. 
It  is  an  historical  science.  We  candidly  admit  that  if  one  is 
looking  for  demonstration  he  will  not  find  it.  The  authori- 
tative character  of  Christianity  is  an  inference  from  a  group  of 
facts  occurring  in  time  which  facts  are  to  be  attested  as  other 
facts  of  history  are  attested.  We  can  never  demonstrate  an 
historical  fact.  We  can  place  it  beyond  a  reasonable  doubt; 
sometimes  beyond  any  doubt  reasonable  or  otherwise,  but  not 
beyond  the  possibility  of  a  question.  A  man  has  a  right  to 
demand  of  us  that  we  furnish  such  a  degree  of  proof  that  to 
believe  is  more  rational  than  to  doubt.  More  than  that  we 
cannot  do,  and  should  not  claim  to  do.  Just  that  much  and 
no  more  we  hope  to  do  in  our  study  of  Christian  Evidences. 

An  attempt  has  been  made  to  turn  the  force  of  inductive 
science  against  us  in  this  manner:  " It  is  contrary  to  experience 
that  a  miracle  should  occur;  it  is  not  contrary  to  experience  that 
testimony  should  be  false."  It  sounds  plausible,  but  try  it. 
Contrary  to  whose  experience  forsooth?  Contrary  to  my 
experience  indeed,  but  if  we  may  believe  them  not  contrary  to 
the  experience  of  Peter  and  John.  But  "it  is  not  contrary  to 
experience  that  testimony  should  be  false."  What  testimony? 
Some  or  all?  If  the  objector  means  some  testimony,  the 
argument  proves  nothing;  if  he  means  all  testimony  his  saying 
is  not  true,  and  as  to  the  particular  testimony  in  mind,  so  far  as 
we  know,  it  is  not  in  human  experience  that  any  testimony 
given  as  this  was  given  has  ever  been  shown  to  be  false.  We 
shall  show  that  if  the  first  witnesses  to  the  origin  of  Christianity 
lied  they  were  a  phenomenal  set  of  liars.  In  no  case  elsewhere 
have  such  been  found. 


CHAPTER  XI 

RIVAL  HYPOTHESES  AS  TO  THE  ORIGIN  OF 
CHRISTIANITY 

CERTAIN  facts  in  regard  to  Christianity  are  undisputed.  There 
was  a  time  when  the  system  did  not  exist.  It  is  in  the  world 
to-day.  An  attempt  to  explain  its  origin  is  as  truly  scientific 
as  a  like  attempt  to  explain  the  origin  of  any  other  event  in 
history.  Its  adherents  defend  themselves  against  the  charge 
of  superstition  by  affirming  the  truth  of  certain  narratives 
embodied  in  the  common  portions  of  their  various  creeds. 
These  narratives  form  what  for  brevity  we  call  the  Gospel 
story.  Now  it  is  scientific  to  examine  that  story,  to  trace  it 
back  as  far  as  we  can,  to  note  whether  it  has  remained  the 
same  in  all  places  and  times,  or  whether  at  any  time  it  has 
received  accretions  and  to  determine  to  what  extent  it  is 
credible.  If  it  is  found  credible  it  is  scientific  to  note  here  a 
cause  of  the  events  in  Christian  history.  If  the  story  is  found 
to  be  false,  it  would  be  the  appropriate  task  of  the  scientific 
historian  to  prove  its  falsity,  and  to  publish  the  facts  in  regard 
to  it.  It  would  be  incumbent  upon  him  also  to  find,  if  possible, 
the  manner  in  which  such  a  fraud  was  perpetrated. 

The  possible  hypotheses  as  to  the  origin  of  Christianity  are 
not  very  numerous.  They  may  be  briefly  and  concisely 
stated  as  follows: 

(1)  We  have  the  hypothesis  of  the  truth  of  the  essent 
portions  of  the  Gospel  story.     Of  course  if  the  story  is  true 
we  have  an  adequate  cause  of  the  social  effects  of  its  prc 
mulgation. 

(2)  We  have  the  hypothesis  of  falsehood  in  either  few 
many  of  the  essential  portions  of    the  Gospel  story.     Tl 
divides  itself  into  several  sub-heads  as  myth,  legend  or  a  pui 

to  intentionally  deceive  may  be  supposed  to  have  swayed  the 

240 


RIVAL  HYPOTHESES 


241 


minds  of  the  early  devotees  of  the  Christian  system.  It  is  in 
place  at  this  point  to  define  and  distinguish  myth  and  legend. 

A  legend  is  a  gradual  and  unconscious  embellishment  or 
modification  of  history  in  the  interest,  real  or  supposed,  of 
philosophy,  morality,  religion,  or  patriotism. 

A  myth  is  formed  for  the  same  purposes  as  a  legend,  but 
differs  from  it  in  that  it  has  no  historic  basis  at  all.  It  is 
wholly  the  outgrowth  of  an  idea,  and  myth  makers  create  the 
story  out  of  their  own  imaginations.  Familiar  examples  of 
this  distinction  suggest  themselves  in  the  story  of  George 
Washington  and  his  little  hatchet,  which  is  legendary,  and 
the  story  of  Santa  Claus,  which  is  a  myth  pure  and  simple. 

Either  a  legend  or  a  myth  may  come  to  be  accepted  as 
history,  but  some  lapse  of  time  is  necessary  if  the  fiction  have 
any  considerable  magnitude. 

Now,  we  may  suppose  Jesus  himself  a  myth.  We  may 
class  him  with  such  Grecian  heroes  as  Hercules,  and  suppose 
the  story  of  his  life  a  pure  fabrication;  or  we  may  suppose  a 
man  of  that  name  to  have  lived  and  taught  at  the  time  when 
he  is  said  to  have  lived  but  that  after  his  death  marvelous 
deeds,  never  heard  of  during  his  life,  were  attributed  to  him, 
and  that  the  story  of  his  life  which  we  now  have  grew  up  about 
his  memory:  or  we  may  suppose  a  case  of  intentional  deception, 
either  that  Jesus  was  himself  an  impostor  and  deceived  his 
disciples,  or  that  the  disciples  were  willful  forgers  of  lies,  which 
they  palmed  off  on  the  multitude  for  facts.  These  rival 
hypotheses  may,  perhaps,  be  best  seen  in  tabulated  form: 


o  g 


TRUTH 
'OR 
FALSEHOOD 


Fraud 


Delusion 


By  Jesus,  his  Apostles,  or  both,  in 
which  case  they  were  impostors. 

By  some  unknown  writers  who 
were  forgers  of  the  present  Gospel 
records. 

Of  Jesus,  or  his  Apostles,  or  both,  in 
which  case  theywere  insane  enthusiasts. 

Of  the  whole  Christian  church  in 
some  post-apostolic  age,  being  legend 
or  myth  duped. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  FOUNDER  OF  CHRISTIANITY  IS  NOT  A 
MYTHICAL  PERSONAGE 

ALTHOUGH  the  mythical  and  legendary  theories  as  to  the  origin 
of  Christianity  may  for  most  purposes  be  considered  together, 
there  are  a  few  considerations  which  apply  with  special  force 
to  the  theory  that  Jesus  is  a  myth.  To  suppose  that  Jesus 
never  lived,  involves  as  great  a  marvel  as  to  suppose  that  he 
lived  and  did  the  things  ascribed  to  him. 

Mythical  heroes  are  located  indefinitely  in  time  and  space. 
In  all  the  range  of  mythology  we  find  no  case  of  a  mythical 
personage  said  to  appear  at  a  definite  place,  at  a  definite  time 
during  the  life  of  the  men  among  whom  the  story  of  his  appear- 
ance originated.  Myths  are  located  in  the  past  —  so  far  as 
the  writer  has  read,  in  the  uncertain  and  remote  past.  The 
received  story  of  the  origin  of  Christianity  is  very  circum- 
stantial as  to  its  founder's  time  and  place  of  living.  He  was 
born  in  Bethlehem,  in  the  days  of  Herod  the  king.  His  public 
ministry  begins  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  Tiberius  Caesar.  He 
dies  at  Jerusalem  under  the  accusation  of  the  priests  of  his 
own  nation,  and  under  sentence  of  Pontius  Pilate,  the  Roman 
governor.  It  is  without  parallel  that  a  myth  should  thus,  keep 
company  with  so  many  men  of  flesh  and  blood.  The  framers 
of  myths  have  been  more  circumspect  in  the  location  of  their 
heroes.  It  would  be  at  great  risk  that  I  would  assert  the 
existence  of  the  pure  creation  of  my  brain  at  any  definite  time 
and  place.  But  to  parallel  the  supposed  audacity  of  the  first 
teachers  of  Christianity,  I  must  locate  my  man  of  straw  within 
my  own  lifetime  and  that  of  the  men  whom  I  presume  to 
instruct.  And,  further,  provoking  for  myself  and  my  hero  the 
most  intense  hate  and  bitter  opposition  during  my  lifetime, 
by  some  unaccountable  infatuation,  not  one  of  my  enemies  of 

242 


JESUS  NOT  A  MYTHICAL  PERSONAGE        243 

my  own  generation  attempts  to  question  the  veritable  existence 
of  my  hero  at  the  time  and  place  I  have  assigned  him.  The 
opponents  of  Christianity  during  the  century  following  the 
death  of  Jesus  left  in  writing  numerous  references  to  his  life 
and  not  one  of  them  calls  in  question  the  verity  of  his  existence 
at  the  time  and  place  set  forth  by  his  adherents.  Josephus,  a 
contemporary  Jewish  historian,  mentions  Jesus  as  living  at  the 
time  claimed.  The  Roman  writers,  Juvenal,  Suetonius,  and 
Tacitus,  all  mention  (unfavorably  it  is  true)  the  remarkable 
spreading  of  Christianity,  as  a  delusion  of  their  times.  How 
readily  they  would  have  exposed  the  fictitious  character  of  its 
founder  could  they  have  done  so.  A  paragraph  from  Tacitus 
which  will  be  quoted  more  fully  later,  has  in  it  one  sentence 
which  is  in  place  here.  Tacitus  wrote  in  about  the  year  100 
of  our  era,  of  the  great  fire  in  Rome,  in  A.D.  64.  He  is  dis- 
cussing the  effort  of  Nero  to  clear  himself  of  the  charge  of 
having  for  his  own  amusement  set  the  city  on  fire,  and  of  his 
effort  to  fasten  the  blame  on  the  Christians.  He  says:  "The 
founder  of  this  name  was  Christ,  who  suffered  death  in  the 
reign  of  Tiberius  under  his  procurator  Pontius  Pilate."  Evi- 
dently during  the  first  century  of  the  Christian  faith  it  was 
undisputed  that  the  founder  was  one  Christ,  that  he  lived 
and  taught  in  Judea,  and  died  in  the  reign  of  Tiberius  under 
sentence  of  Pilate  his  governor.  Admitting  that  I  can  induce 
a  credulous  people  to  believe  in  the  existence  among  them  of 
the  simple  creation  of  my  brain,  there  remains  a  harder  problem 
still.  It  must  be  believed  that  my  enemies  have  the  stupidity 
to  concede  the  historic  reality  of  my  hero.  It  will  yet  be  in 
order  for  the  critic  to  insist  on  the  legendary  character  of  the 
account  of  Jesus,  given  us  by  his  friends,  that  they  may  have 
modified  and  embellished  history,  that  they  may  have  created 
some  stories  about  their  hero,  but  the  hero  himself  they  did 
not  create.  Jesus  is  not  a  myth.  He  is  an  historic  man.  The 
accounts  given  of  him  are  to  be  examined  as  to  their  uncor- 
rupted  preservation,  as  you  would  examine  any  reputed  history. 
If  we  find  that  these  accounts,  marvelous  as  they  are,  are  the 
original  stories  told  by  the  first  teachers  of  Christianity,  then 


244  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

we  must  face  the  question  of  their  credibility;  and  we  will  not 
ask  any  man  to  believe  them  unless  that  after  investigation  it 
appear  a  more  rational  thing  to  believe  than  to  deny  them. 

Before  entering  on  the  consideration  of  the  legendary 
theory  a  few  words  are  in  place  as  to  the  sources  of  our  evidence 
of  the  trustworthiness  of  the  Gospel  story. 

All  persons  claiming  to  be  original  witnesses  of  the  events 
pertaining  to  the  origin  of  Christianity  have  long  been  dead. 
In  any  attempt  which  we  make  to  ascertain  the  truth  as  to 
those  events  we  are  shut  up  to  the  same  methods  which  the 
students  of  history  use  in  their  study  of  events,  whose  original 
witnesses  are  dead.  If  I  wish  to  ascertain  the  facts  as  to  the 
battle  of  Shiloh  several  courses  are  open  to  me.  I  may  go  to 
the  library  and  read  what  I  may  there  find;  but  I  have  the 
further  opportunity  to  go  down  here  on  the  street  and  converse 
with  men  and  women  who  were  living  when  the  reports  of  such 
a  battle  originated.  They  are  able  to  tell  me  whether  my 
reading  in  the  library  agrees  with  what  they  heard  with  their 
ears  on  those  April  days  of  1862.  Moreover,  a  few  men  are 
still  living  who  were  there;  and  to  them  I  may  submit  my 
report  for  verification  or  correction.  If,  however,  I  inquire  as 
to  the  battles  of  Lexington  and  Bunker  Hill,  my  opportunities 
are  confined  to  the  written  record,  for  the  original  witnesses 
are  all  dead  and  you  will  search  long  before  you  find  a  man  who 
ever  heard  a  word  spoken  by  one  of  them.  Observe  that  we 
are  in  no  doubt,  however,  as  to  the  correctness  of  the  account 
of  the  battle  of  Lexington.  A  story  long  or  short,  reduced  to 
writing  during  the  lifetime  of  its  witnesses  and  standing  the 
test  of  criticism  during  their  generation,  is  a  fixture  in  history. 
No  sane  man  would  think  of  questioning  the  credibility  of  the 
accepted  account  of  the  battle  of  Lexington,  the  siege  of  York- 
town  or  the  surrender  of  Cornwallis  any  more  than  he  would 
of  disputing  the  story  of  Shiloh,  or  of  the  surrender  of  Lee  at 
Appomattox.  Nor  will  any  further  lapse  of  time  diminish  the 
confidence  with  which  men  will  receive  those  accounts.  We 
are  no  less  certain  of  the  events  of  the  English  revolution  than 
we  are  of  our  own.  Men  will  always  differ  in  their  estimate 


JESUS  NOT  A  MYTHICAL  PERSONAGE        245 

of  the  character  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  but  the  story  of  the 
events  in  which  he  and  his  Ironsides  bore  so  prominent  a  part 
will  be  read  with  undiminished  confidence  a  thousand  years 
from  now. 

As  Christian  apologists  we  bring  forward  the  contents  of 
certain  old  books,  which  purport  to  contain  the  observations 
of  the  original  witnesses  of  the  facts,  pertaining  to  the  origin  of 
Christianity.  In  this  discussion  we  lay  aside  for  the  time 
every  claim  to  any  particular  sanctity  for  these  books.  They 
are  submitted  for  criticism,  as  to  their  genuineness,  authen- 
ticity, and  the  good  faith  of  their  authors.  They  are  to  stand 
on  their  merits;  and  as  a  record  of  facts  observed  and  inter- 
preted by  their  authors,  they  are  entitled  to  the  same  treatment 
which  we  give  to  other  ancient  books  such  as  Caesar's  Com- 
mentaries or  Xenophon's  Memorabilia.  Our  testimony  is 
direct  and  collateral.  The  direct  testimony  is  contained  in 
the  four  narratives  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and  John,  each 
purporting  to  give  an  account  of  some  of  the  facts  in  the  ministry 
of  Jesus,  current  among  his  followers,  in  that  generation  in 
which  Jesus  lived.  Our  collateral  testimony  is  of  two  kinds: 
(i)  Incidental  references  to  Jesus  and  his  ch'sciples  by  Jewish 
and  Roman  writers  of  the  century  including  and  following  the 
death  of  Jesus.  We  should  not  expect  these  references  to  be 
numerous,  extended  or  favorable  to  Christianity,  yet  we  may 
find  them  to  have  an  important  bearing  on  some  facts  under 
discussion.  (2)  We  have  a  collection  of  ancient  books:  The 
Acts  of  the  Apostles,  and  the  Epistles.  The  Book  of  Acts 
purports  to  give  an  account  of  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel  in 
various  parts  of  the  Roman  world  during  the  lifetime  of  the 
generation  to  which  Jesus  belonged.  The  Epistles  are  letters 
addressed  to  different  persons  and  churches  by  several  of  the 
Apostles  of  Jesus.  They  are  of  use  to  us,  not  as  proof  of  the 
truth  of  the  gospel  story,  but  as  showing  what  was  the  character 
of  the  story  current  in  the  Christian  churches  in  the  middle 
of  the  first  century.  We  might  expect  that  the  enemies  of 
Christianity  would  demand  that  we  purge  these  books  from 
the  suspicion  of  fictitious  composition,  similar  to  that  which 


246  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

they  attach  to  the  Gospels  themselves;  yet  of  some  of  them  the 
genuineness  has  never  been  seriously  questioned. 

Evidently  there  are  two  questions  which  may  be  raised 
about  the  testimony  of  any  witness:  i.  To  what  does  the 
witness  testify?  2.  What  degree  of  credit  is  to  be  given  to 
his  testimony?  Under  the  latter  question  we  consider  both 
the  competency  and  veracity  of  the  witness.  We  examine 
everything  bearing  on  his  disposition  to  speak  the  truth.  We 
inquire  also  as  to  his  opportunity  to  know  the  things  of  which  he 
would  testify.  Applying  these  principles  to  the  Gospel  story 
before  we  can  pass  judgment  on  its  credibility,  we  must  deter- 
mine whether  the  story  which  we  now  have  is  the  one  originally 
told,  or  whether  it  is  of  legendary  origin.  Is  the  story  of  the 
origin  of  Christianity  contained  in  these  four  books  the  one 
which  the  first  disciples  of  Jesus  proclaimed  when  they  went 
from  place  to  place  urging  men  to  believe  in  Jesus  Christ  and 
to  be  baptized  in  his  name?  If  it  is  not:  that  is  if  it  is  a  materi- 
ally different  story;  if  its  central  incidents  are  things  that  the 
original  disciples  of  Jesus  did  not  say;  if  these  incidents  are  the 
inventions  and  interpolations  of  a  succeeding  age,  then  we 
may  and  should  dismiss  the  whole  matter.  If,  for  example,  the 
men  of  that  generation  in  which  Jesus  died  heard  nothing  of 
his  resurrection,  we  need  not  spend  a  moment  in  the  considera- 
tion of  any  account  of  it  invented  and  circulated  in  succeeding 
generations.  Such  an  account  should  be  relegated  to  the 
realm  of  pure  fiction.  But  if  we  find  that  the  story  which 
we  now  have  is  the  one  first  told;  if  it  appear  to  be  an  imcor- 
rupted  statement  of  what  those  intimate  companions  of  Jesus 
professed  to  have  seen  and  heard,  then  there  remains  for  us 
the  examination  of  the  competence  and  integrity  of  these 
witnesses.  What  is  the  probability  that  they  bring  us  a 
correct  report?  In  short,  is  the  story  true? 


CHAPTER  XIII 

WAS  THE  WHOLE  CHRISTIAN  CHURCH  AT  SOME 
TIME  LEGEND-DUPED? 

THE  suggestion  of  such  a  possibility  sends  us  to  inquire  at  what 
time,  if  at  all,  this  duping  occurred.  This  theory  asserts 
that  our  present  Gospel  records  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and 
John  do  not  give  the  original  Christian  story;  that  they  contain 
material  accretions  which  have  been  added  by  a  marvel  loving 
people.  For  example,  Jesus  did  not  have  a  miraculous  birth 
nor  was  such  a  thing  claimed  for  him.  He  did  not  multiply 
the  loaves  and  fishes,  nor  did  the  disciples  ever  claim  that  he 
did.  Most  important  of  all,  Jesus  did  not  rise  from  the  dead 
nor  did  the  first  Christian  preachers  claim  that  he  had.  Each 
of  these  stories  is  a  legend  which  has  been  added  to  the  original 
and  more  natural  account  of  the  simple  and  pure-minded 
Jewish  peasant.  The  original  story  then  is  what  we  desire  to 
find,  and  there  is  no  more  natural  procedure  in  such  an  investi- 
gation than  to  follow  back  the  story  which  we  now  have,  and 
find  when  and  where  any  of  its  incidents  are  added  to  pre- 
existing material.  We  could  do  this  century  by  century.  For 
example,  suppose  it  were  asserted  that  the  account  had  received 
important  additions  during  the  last  century.  We  might 
fairly  challenge  the  party  so  asserting  to  show  what  had  been 
added  and  to  prove  when  it  had  been  done.  But  we  will  do 
better  than  that.  We  will  undertake  that  difficult  thing  in 
judicial  procedure.  We  will  prove  the  negative.  And  for 
this  we  have  abundant  material  at  our  command:  (i)  There 
is  in  the  city  where  this  is  written  an  old  leather  bound,  worn 
and  ragged  copy  of  the  Scriptures,  bearing  the  imprint  of  an 
Edinburgh  publishing  house,  in  the  year  1796.  In  it  you  will 
find  each  of  the  four  Gospels  in  the  same  place  which  it  occupies 
in  the  copies  now  being  run  from  the  presses  of  the  American 

247 


248  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Bible  Society.  Further:  examine  any  one  of  those  Gospels 
and  you  will  find  every  incident,  every  parable,  and  the  account 
of  every  miracle  in  the  identical  place  which  it  holds  in  your 
vest  pocket  testament.  Indeed,  barring  typographical  errors 
and  a  few  small  variations  in  translation,  it  is  a  verbatim  et 
literatim  copy.  In  the  face  of  this  no  one  will  affirm  that  the 
Gospel  story  has  received  any  accretion  during  the  last  one 
hundred  years.  (2)  But  we  would  not  be  devoid  of  means 
of  investigation  if  there  were  no  old  copies  of  the  English  Bible 
at  hand.  About  one  hundred  years  ago  the  Bible  was  trans- 
lated into  several  Asiatic  tongues,  and  has  been  in  use  in  those 
languages  and  in  those  countries  ever  since.  Now  nothing 
but  collusion  with  fraudulent  purpose  (which  is  not  the  pres- 
ent hypothesis)  could  cause  simultaneous  variations  in  two 
languages.  But  take  a  copy  of  the  Hindustani  or  Chinese 
Bible  and  compare  the  Gospels  as  there  found  with  the  present 
English  version  and  you  have  proven  by  another  method  that 
the  Gospel  story  has  received  no  material  addition  during  the 
last  century.  (3)  Let  every  copy  of  the  Scriptures  in  every 
language  —  every  copy  except  your  pocket  Bible  —  be  de- 
stroyed to-night.  You  look  inquiringly  at  that  copy  which 
you  hold  in  your  hand  and  ask:  "Have  I  any  way  by  which  I 
may  assure  myself  that  the  Gospel  story  contained  herein  is 
the  same  which  was  in  circulation  one  hundred  years  ago?" 
Most  certainly  you  have.  John  Witherspoon,  John  Wesley, 
and  Jonathan  Edwards  left  a  voluminous  literature.  It  is 
easily  proven  that  they  had  the  same  Gospel  story,  because 
they  quote  it.  There  is  not  a  Gospel  incident  on  which  some 
one  of  them  did  not  write  a  sermon.  There  is  not  a  chapter 
on  which  some  one  of  them  did  not  write  a  commentary. 

Every  one  will  admit  that  each  one  of  these  methods  is  a 
fair  one.  Any  one  of  them  is  a  proper  method  of  pushing 
back  the  supposed  additions  to  the  Gospel  story.  How  far 
can  we  push  them  back?  We  answer  that  by  each  and  every 
one  of  the  methods  indicated  you  can  push  back  the  possi- 
bility of  any  accretions  to  the  Gospel  story  into  the  early  part 
of  the  fourth  century,  as  far  certainly  as  the  Council  of  Nice 


CHRISTIAN  CHURCH  LEGEND-DUPED?        249 

in  A.  D.  325.  An  example  of  the  proof  from  translations  is  in 
the  Latin  version  called  the  Vulgate,  published  in  A.  D.  405. 
Remember  too  that  the  narrative  which  we  there  read  in 
Latin  is  the  very  same  account  as  that  contained  in  the  English 
Revised  Version,  translated  from  the  original  Greek  and  pub- 
lished nearly  fifteen  hundred  years  later.  Very  credulous, 
indeed,  would  he  appear  who  could  believe  that  the  same 
legends  could  have  grown  in  Greek,  Latin,  and  English  at  the 
same  rate.  The  proceedings  of  the  Council  of  Nice  as  well 
as  the  Nicene  creed  itself  are  certain  testimony  to  the  current 
acceptance  of  the  Gospel  story  at  that  time  in  its  present  form. 
There  are,  moreover,  two  manuscript  copies  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment unquestionably  belonging  to  that  century  which  are 
considered  of  ultimate  authority  in  questions  relating  to  the 
form  of  the  original  text. 

As  we  go  back  from  the  fourth  century  we  have  not  so 
many  kinds  of  proof.  As  to  manuscripts  they  are  few,  frag- 
mentary, and  there  is  sometimes  uncertainty  in  their  identifi- 
cation, but  we  have  left  us  the  quotations  and  references  made 
by  the  Christian  Fathers,  in  their  published  writings  from  the 
originals  of  which  numerous  copies  were  made  in  the  succeed- 
ing centuries.  We  do  not  claim  any  Divine  authority  for  the 
patristic  writings.  We  do  not  indorse  all  their  theology  or 
philosophy,  nor  approve  everything  in  their  lives.  We  shall 
expect  that  they  will  sometimes  be  found  quoting  the  Gospels 
in  defense  of  erroneous  theories.  For  the  purpose  of  our 
investigation  it  matters  not;  the  quotation  proves  the  form  of 
the  Gospel  story  which  was  in  existence  and  accessible  to  the 
writers  at  the  time  of  their  writing.  The  authors  to  whom  we 
call  attention  are  among  those  whose  work  is  unquestioned. 
They  themselves  are  quoted  by  other  writers  in  every  century 
until  the  Reformation.  Observe  also  this  fact:  while  their 
writings  do  establish  the  early  collection  of  the  books  of  the 
New  Testament  into  one  volume,  that  collection  is  not  the 
fact  for  which  we  inquire.  The  existence  of  a  book  containing 
a  story  is  proof  of  the  existence  of  the  story,  but  the  story  is 
older  than  any  one  book,  of  course  older  than  a  collection  of 


2so  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

books,  and  it  is  the  original  form  of  the  story  which  we  wish 
to  ascertain.  The  first  teachers  of  Christianity  did  not  go 
about  carrying  a  newly  written  book.  They  did  not  begin 
their  work  by  writing  a  book,  though  Mohammed,  Joseph 
Smith,  and  Mrs.  Eddy  would  seem  to  have  thought  that  they 
did.  We  repeat  the  first  teachers  of  Christianity  did  not 
begin  their  work  by  writing  a  book;  they  simply  went  about 
telling  a  story  of  events  of  which  they  claimed  to  have  been 
eye  and  ear  witnesses.  We  wish  to  find  what  that  story  was. 
Was  it  the  one  which  we  now  have?  Was  it  the  one  which 
the  authors  of  the  monographs  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and 
John  say  they  told  or  was  it  another?  It  may  help  us  in  our 
study  to  present  the  problem  graphically: 


Let  the  line  t-t'  represent  the  time  from  the  beginning  of 
our  era  until  the  year  1900.  On  this  line  to  any  convenient 
scale  lay  off  the  centuries.  From  t  lay  off  thirty-three  years. 
In  that  year  Jesus  died  and  the  propagation  of  Christianity 
began.  Here  was  the  original  Gospel  story;  and  as  our  objector 
insists  that  it  is  an  uncertain  quantity,  at  any  rate  that  it  differed 
from  the  present  one,  we  will  designate  that  unknown  original 
story  by  the  letter  x  placed  at  A.  D.  33.  Designate  the  present 
story  as  found  in  the  first  four  books  of  the  New  Testament 
by  the  letter  a,  placed  at  the  other  end  of  the  line  at  A.  D.  1900. 
Now  our  problem  is  to  bring  x  and  a  together;  to  compare 
them  and  to  see  whether  x  equals  a.  As  we  have  already 
seen  we  are  assured  that  there  have  been  no  changes  in  the 
present  accepted  story  since  the  time  of  the  Nicene  Council. 
No  critic  will  object  to  our  moving  a  back  to  A.  D.  325.  But 
there  would  be  some  time  during  which  the  first  teachers  of 
Christianity  would  continue  to  tell  the  original  story.  We 
will,  therefore,  be  warranted  in  moving  x  somewhat  forward. 
How  much?  Some  would  say  until  the  death  of  the  Apostle 
John  in  A.  D.  98,  but  as  we  wish  to  be  on  perfectly  safe  ground 
we  will  place  it  within  the  lifetime  of  the  contemporaries  of 


CHRISTIAN  CHURCH  LEGEND-DUPED?        251 

Jesus  at  A.  D.  75.  Our  quest  is  then  confined  to  a  period  of 
two  hundred  and  fifty  years,  from  A.  D.  75  to  A.  D.  325.  This 
is  the  period  within  which  are  found  the  writings  of  the  men 
known  as  the  Ante-Nicene  Fathers.  In  this  discussion  our 
references  to  volumes  and  pages  are  to  an  edition  published 
by  the  Scribners.  The  translations  were  made  by  eminent 
classical  scholars  and  bear  the  marks  of  painstaking  care. 
As  we  have  already  indicated,  there  is  no  dispute  about  the 
existence  of  the  whole  New  Testament,  including  the  four 
Gospels,  in  its  present  form  at  the  time  of  the  Council  of  Nice. 
No  one  claims  that  these  books  originated  then.  Evidently 
our  story  "a"  will  be  projected  backward  some  years.  It  is 
difficult  to  say  how  far,  but  we  do  not  believe  it  necessary  to 
burden  the  discussion  with  a  detailed  examination  of  the 
writings  of  the  men  of  the  years  immediately  preceding  that 
Council.  Had  the  Gospel  story  been  undergoing  change 
within  their  recollection  that  fact  would  certainly  have  been 
noted  and  discussed  by  some  of  that  body  of  devout  but  remark- 
ably contentious  men.  If  we  find  our  story  still  farther  back 
we  may  spare  ourselves  the  minute  search  for  it  in  the  years 
immediately  preceding  the  meeting  of  the  Council.  If,  how- 
ever, any  one  wishes  to  examine  minutely  "  every  inch  of 
ground,"  he  will  find  numerous  quotations  from  the  Gospels 
in  the  works  of  Alexander  of  Alexandria  (273-326),  in  a  letter 
also  of  one  Arnobius  written  somewhere  between  the  years 
297  and  326,  and  in  the  voluminous  writings  of  Cyprian, 
Bishop  of  Carthage,  who  suffered  martyrdom  in  that  city  in 
A.  D.  258. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY 

THE  first  author  we  will  examine  minutely  is  Origen.  This 
famous,  divine  philosopher,  teacher,  and  preacher  was  born 
in  Alexandria  in  A.  D.  185,  and  died  in  Tyre  in  A.  D.  254.  His 
father  was  a  Greek  named  Leonides,  a  man  of  some  wealth 
and  learning,  who  spent  his  time  as  a  teacher  of  grammar  and 
rhetoric  in  some  of  the  schools  of  Alexandria  for  which  that 
city  of  Grecian  culture  was  then  famous.  Leonides  was  a 
Christian,  and  besides  instructing  his  son  in  Greek  philosophy, 
required  him  daily  to  commit  to  memory  portions  of  the 
Christian  Scriptures.  The  boy,  like  many  another  inquisitive 
child,  made  his  father  much  trouble  by  inquiring  for  the  deeper 
meaning  of  portions  of  the  Prophets  and  Epistles.  It  is  said 
that  the  patience  of  Leonides  was  sorely  tried,  and  yet  father- 
like  he  secretly  rejoiced  in  the  spirit  of  independent  and  original 
inquiry  manifested  by  his  talented  son.  The  questioning  of 
the  boy  seemed  to  fix  rather  than  to  shake  his  faith,  for,  when 
on  the  breaking  out  of  a  season  of  persecution,  Leonides  was 
thrown  into  prison  from  which  he  was  soon  after  brought 
out  to  execution,  Origen,  then  only  seventeen  years  old,  was 
with  difficulty  restrained  by  his  mother  from  acting .  with 
such  rashness  as  to  bring  on  himself  his  father's  fate.  From 
this  time  he  grew  in  influence  in  the  Christian  community. 
This  is  not  a  biography,  so  we  will  not  follow  his  life  of  service 
in  his  native  city,  in  Greece,  in  Palestine,  and  in  Tyre.  He 
was  a  very  voluminous  writer.  Only  a  portion  of  his  works 
has  been  preserved,  yet  the  English  translation  of  that  portion 
fills  four  hundred  and  thirty-two  large  pages.  His  chief 
work  was  a  reply  to  Celsus,  a  Greek  author  who  from  the 
standpoint  of  a  Jew  had  written  an  attack  on  Christianity. 
The  Jews  have  not  preserved  the  work  of  Celsus,  but  Christians 

252 


TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY         253 

have  preserved  Origen's  reply,  and  from  it  a  pretty  good  idea 
of  the  work  of  Celsus  may  be  obtained.     We  do  not  know 
the  date  of  the  attack  of  Celsus,  but,  from  the  manner  in  which 
Origen  speaks  of  him,  he  evidently  belonged  to  a  generation 
older  than  his  critic.    The  argument  is  a  very  extended  one, 
and  Wright  well  remarks:    "So  exhaustive  was  the  treatment 
that  unbelievers  since  have  done  little  but  rehabilitate  the 
argument  of  Celsus.    And  defenders  of  the  faith  in  most  cases 
can  do  little  better  than  reiterate  the  answers  of  Origen." 
It  is  worthy  of  note  that  while  Celsus  disputes  the  credibility 
of  the  Gospel  story,  he  does  not  attack  its  genuineness.     For 
example  he  disputes  the  story  of  the  resurrection,  because  such 
a  thing  could  not  occur,  but  he  does  not  call  in  question  the 
apostolic  origin  of  the  story.     Celsus  is  sometimes  quoted  by 
Origen  in  a  manner  which  shows  him  to  have  been  acquainted 
with  the   Gospel    narrative.     Celsus   knew   that   miraculous 
powers  were  ascribed  to  Jesus  and  shows  no  suspicion  of  the 
existence  of  an  earlier  story  from  which  the  miraculous  features 
were  lacking.     He  has  heard  the  story  of  the  sojourn  in  Egypt, 
and  supposes  Jesus  to  have  remained  there  long  enough  to 
have  learned  Egyptian  magic,  as  we  read   that   he  "there 
acquired  some  miraculous  powers  on  which  the  Egyptians 
greatly  pride  themselves";  that  he  then  "returned  to  his  own 
country  highly  elated  on  account  of  them,  and  by  means  of 
these  proclaimed  himself  a  god."    It  would  thus  appear  that 
at  the  time  of  Celsus  Christians  were  claiming  that  Jesus  had 
wrought  miracles,  and  it  seemed  easier  to  the  enemies  of  the 
faith  to  admit  the  phenomena  and  account  for  them  on  the 
hypothesis  of  magic  than  to  attempt  a  denial  of  the  phenomena. 
But  such  a  denial  would  have  been  their  most  effective  pro- 
cedure had  there  been  any  tradition  of  an  earlier  and  wholly 
naturalistic  account  of  the  life  of  Jesus.     Celsus  is  aware  of 
the  Christian  claim  of  the  supernatural  birth  of  Jesus,  as  he 
imagines  a  Jew  in  conversation  with  Jesus  charging  him  with 
having   "invented  your  birth  from  a  virgin."     Clearly  the 
doctrine  of  the  virgin  birth  had  been  taught  before  the  time  of 
Celsus.     This  same  Jew,  in  another  place,  is  represented  as 


254  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

saying:  "What  need  moreover  was  there  that  you,  while  still 
an  infant,  should  be  conveyed  into  Egypt?  Was  it  to  escape 
being  murdered?  But  then  it  was  not  likely  that  a  God 
should  be  afraid  of  death,  and  yet  an  angel  came  down  from 
heaven  commanding  you  and  your  friends  to  flee  lest  ye  should 
be  captured  and  put  to  death."  Celsus  may  not  have  believed 
the  second  chapter  of  Matthew,  but  he  was  aware  of  its  contents. 
In  Origen's  works  as  we  have  them,  there  are  from  Matthew 
one  hundred  and  forty-six  quotations,  from  Mark  ten,  from 
Luke  forty-four,  from  John  one  hundred  and  five.  These 
quotations  are  from  twenty-six  of  Matthew's  twenty-eight 
chapters,  eight  of  Mark's  sixteen,  nineteen  of  Luke's  twenty- 
four,  and  nineteen  of  John's  twenty-one.  He  makes  quotations 
also  from  ten  different  chapters  of  Acts.  The  Epistles  are 
familiar  to  him.  His  quotations  from  them  are  numerous 
and  sometimes  extended.  They  are  made  from  Romans, 
First  Corinthians,  Secpnd  Corinthians,  Gallatians,  Ephesians, 
Philippians,  Colossians,  First  and  Second  Thessalonians,  First 
and  Second  Timothy,  Titus,  Hebrews,  James,  First  Peter, 
First  John,  Jude,  and  Revelation.  The  student  may  verify 
the  following  quotations  from  the  Gospels:  Vol.  IV. 

Page  243  —  John  4:20-24  Page  395  —  Matt.  27:11-14 

260  —  Matt.  $ ru-ss  390  —  Matt.  7:22 


269  —  Matt. 

279  —  Matt.  22:12-13 

280  —  Matt.  12:35 

281  — Matt.  11:27 

281  — John  21:25 

282  — Matt.  26:38 

283  — John  8:46, 

283  —  John  14:30 

284  —  Luke  i  : 


399  —  Matt.  7:22 

418  —  Matt.  2:6 

419  —  John  7:42 

419  —  Matt.  28:13-14 

423  — John  18:36 

424  —  Luke  5 :8 

431— 

431  —  Mark  i  :i-2 

432 — John  13:8 


389  —  Matt.  26:29-38  432 — Luke  22:27 

394  —  John  10:3  435  —  Matt.  27 :3~5 

394  —  Luke  1 1 19  460  —  Matt.  28:1-9 

395  —  Matt.  26:59-63 

As  showing  the  easy  familiarity  with  which  he  appeals  to 
the  Gospel  records  and  the  naturalness  with  which  his  quota- 
tions are  made,  read  a  paragraph  on  page  456:  "Jesus  accord- 
ingly, as  Celsus  imagines,  exhibited  after  his  death  only  the 


TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY         255 

appearance  of  wounds  received  on  the  cross  and  was  not  in 
reality  so  wounded  as  he  is  described  to  have  been.  Whereas 
according  to  the  teaching  of  the  Gospel  (some  portions  of 
which  Celsus  accepts  —  and  other  parts  of  which  he  rejects) 
Jesus  called  to  him  one  of  his  disciples  who  was  sceptical,  and 
who  deemed  the  miracle  an  impossibility  —  and,  therefore,  he 
did  not  merely  say  'unless  I  see  I  will  not  believe,  but  added 
'  Unless  I  put  my  hand  into  the  print  of  the  nails  and  lay  my 
hand  upon  his  side  I  will  not  believe '  —  Jesus  accordingly 
called  Thomas  and  said  '  Reach  hither  thy  finger  and  behold  my 
hands;  and  reach  hither  thy  hand  and  thrust  it  into  my  side, 
and  be  not  faithless  but  believing.'  "  While  verifying  the  above 
references  there  will  be  discovered  numerous  other  quotations 
from  the  Gospels.  Quotations  from  the  other  books  of  the 
New  Testament  also  appear  on  nearly  every  page.  The 
following  are  examples: 

Page  261  —  Eph.  4:13  Page  273  —  Rom.  1 11-4 

261 — I  Cor.  1:10  279  —  I  Pet.  3:18-21 

"     273  —  Heb.  9:26  "     286  —  I  John  2:1-2 

"     273  —  Acts  7  "     456  —  I  Cor.  15:3-8 

(large  part  of  the  chapter)  388  —  Heb.  11:37 

It  will  be  observed  in  this  last  reference  that  there  was  even 
then  a  dispute  about  the  authorship  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews.  From  these  lists  of  quotations  which  could  easily 
have  been  extended,  it  is  clear  that  Origen  was  acquainted 
with  the  Gospel  story  as  we  now  have  it,  and  it  is  of  almost 
equal  significance  that  he  does  not  appear  to  have  ever  heard 
of  any  rival  story.  Further,  that  story  had  long  before  been 
reduced  to  writing  in  the  four  forms  in  which  the  Christian 
world  now  has  it.  He  was  also  familiar  with  what  we  have 
called  the  collateral  evidences  of  the  antiquity  of  the  Gospel 
story;  the  epistles  of  Paul,  John,  and  Peter  are  familiar  to  him. 
He  quotes  them  with  the  same  deference  and  respect  which  a 
preacher  of  the  present  day  would  show  for  them.  Now  in  a 
church  where  the  New  Testament  was  in  circulation  no  one 
could  thrust  a  new  book  into  the  New  Testament  canon  without 
the  knowledge  of  a  fifteen-year-old  boy.  Remember,  too,  that 


256  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Origen  is  a  defender  of  the  faith  in  which  he  had  been  instructed 
in  childhood  and  for  which  his  father  had  died  a  martyr. 
Everything  combines  to  cause  him  to  guard  jealously  the  tra- 
ditions which  he  had  received.  We  are  safely  on  the  ground 
of  historic  certainty  when  we  say  that  before  the  year  two 
hundred  of  our  era  the  books  which  compose  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  we  have  it  had  been  written,  collected,  published, 
and  circulated,  and  by  the  general  consent  of  the  churches 
were  accepted  as  authoritative.  Whatever  legend  duping 
may  have  been,  occurred  before  A.  D.  200,  for  neither  the  Gospel 
story  as  contained  in  the  four  Gospels,  nor  the  other  books  of 
the  New  Testament  have  received  any  material  alteration  since 
that  time.  We  are  certainly  justified  in  moving  "a"  back 
to  A.  D.  200. 

The  life  of  Titus  Flavius  Clemens,  better  known  as  Clement 
of  Alexandria,  cannot  be  as  circumstantially  written  as  that 
of  some  other  authors.  The  time  of  his  birth  has  been  indefi- 
nitely assigned  to  somewhere  between  the  years  A.  D.  150  and 
A.  D.  1 60.  It  is  related  that  on  embracing  the  Christian  faith 
he  traveled  extensively  over  Greece,  Italy,  Palestine,  and 
Egypt.  Returning  to  Alexandria  he  took  the  place  of  Pantaenus 
at  the  head  of  the  Catechetical  school  in  A.  D.  189,  having  the 
boy  Origen  as  one  of  his  pupils.  Evidently  his  testimony  to 
the  character  of  the  Gospel  story  will  carry  us  to  a  period 
antedating  Origen.  His  writings  are  extensive  and  important. 
He  wrote  both  prose  and  verse.  One  of  his  lyrics  "  Shepherd 
of  Tender  Youth"  has  been  translated  into  almost  every 
language  in  which  the  Gospel  has  been  preached.  It  will  be 
found  as  number  672  in  the  Methodist  Hymnal.  The  most 
important  of  his  works  are  "The  Exhortation  to  the  Heathen," 
"The  Instructor,"  and  "The  Miscellanies."  The  first  of 
these  as  its  name  would  indicate  is  addressed  to  pagan  readers 
and  deals  largely  with  the  absurdities  of  idolatry.  When  we 
remember  that  Paul  on  Mars  Hill  took  his  text  from  a  heathen 
altar,  and  quoted  the  Greek  poets,  we  need  not  be  surprised 
that  in  this  work  Biblical  quotations  are  rare,  and  those  from 
the  Greek  classics  numerous.  The  other  works  are  addressed 


TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY         257 

to  Christians,  and  quotations  from  both  the  Old  and  New 
Testament  are  found  on  nearly  every  page.  We  find  in  the 
writings  of  Clement  one  hundred  and  ninety-seven  quotations 
from  Matthew,  twenty-six  from  Mark,  one  hundred  and  four 
from  Luke,  and  eighty-three  from  John.  These  quotations 
are  from  twenty-five  of  Matthew's  twenty-eight  chapters, 
twelve  of  Mark's  sixteen,  twenty-one  of  Luke's  twenty-four, 
and  eighteen  of  John's  twenty-one.  He  also  quotes  largely 
from  Acts,  from  Revelation,  and  from  all  the  Epistles  except 
Philemon,  and  Second  and  Third  John.  The  reader  may 
verify  the  following  in  Vol.  II. 

Page  212  —  John  21:4-5  Page  232  —  Luke  10:22 

212  —  Matt.  19:14  232  —  Matt.  11:28 


212  — Matt.  18:3 
212  —  Matt.  23:37 
212  — John  13:33 
216  —  John  5:24 

216  —  John  6:40 

217  —  Luke  10:21 
221— John  4 -.3  2-34 
226  —  John  15:1-2 
232  —  Matt,  ii  13-6 


234  —  John  10:11 

238  —  Luke  14:12-16 

239  —  Matt.  15:11 
241  —  Matt.  22:21 
241  — Luke  24:41-44 
574  —  Mark  14:62 
584  — Luke  9:55 

591  —  Matt.  19:24 

592  —  Mark  10:30-31 


On  pages  571-577  will  be  found  quite  a  full  commentary  on 
the  Epistles  of  First  Peter,  Jude,  and  First  John. 

We  may  verify  also  a  few  quotations  from  the  Acts  and  the 
Epistles  of  Paul. 

Page  321  —  Acts  17 12 2-28  Page  436  —  Rom.  5 13-5 
321  —  Acts  26:17-18  429  —  I  Cor.  13:7 

335  —  Acts  5  :i-io  429  —  I  Cor.  13 11-3 

241 — Acts  10:10-15  314  —  I  Cor.  15:32-33 

444  —  Rom.  1:11-12  374  —  I  Cor.  15:50 

444  —  Rom.  4:3  340  '—  I  Tim.  1 15-8 

We  will  next  examine  an  author  partly  contemporary  with 
Clement,  but  living  and  working  in  a  far  removed  portion  of  the 
empire. 

Tertullian  was  born  at  Carthage  in  A.  D.  145.  It  is  claimed 
that  he  lived  to  the  age  of  ninety-five,  dying  in  A.D.  240.  His 
life  was  divided  between  Carthage  and  Rome,  and  the  church 
at  Rome  seems  to  have  grown  rapidly  during  his  ministry 


258  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

there.  His  temperament  led  him  into  fanaticism,  and  his 
later  years  were  spent  in  fellowship  with  the  sect  known  as  the 
Motanists,  but  the  genuineness  of  his  works  has  never  been 
questioned,  and  they  have  been  studied  with  confidence  in  all 
succeeding  ages  by  heretic  and  Catholic  alike.  He  quotes 
from  each  of  the  Gospels:  from  Matthew  four  hundred  and 
fifty-three  times,  from  Mark  seventy-nine  times,  from  Luke 
five  hundred  and  twenty-two  times,  and  from  John  two  hundred 
and  fifty-six  times.  These  quotations  are  from  every  chapter 
of  Matthew,  from  fifteen  chapters  of  Mark,  and  from  every 
chapter  in  Luke  and  John.  He  also  quotes  from  each  of  the 
Epistles  except  Philemon,  and  makes  eighty-four  quotations 
from  twenty-three  chapters  of  Acts.  In  Vol.  IV  the  student 
may  verify  the  following  quotations  and  in  doing  so  will  observe 
many  others  equally  striking. 
Page  95  —  Luke  12:57  Page  253  —  John  19:26-27 


216  —  Matt.  17:12 
216  —  Matt.  11:14 
245  —  Matt.  7:15 
247  —  Luke  16:29 
247  — John  5:39 
247  —  Matt.  15:24 
247  —  Matt.  28:19 
247  —  John  16:13 
253  —  Mark  4:34 


374  —  Luke  7:1-10 

376  —  Luke  7:26-28 

377  —  Matt.  12:48 
377  — Luke  10:25 
377  —  Luke  8:16-18 
422  —  Luke  24:3-4 
422  — Luke  24:25 
422  — Luke  24:37-39 
422  —  Luke  24:41 


253— Matt.  16:18 

These  last  two  references,  it  will  be  observed,  are  from 
Luke's  account  of  the  resurrection.  To  appreciate  fully  their 
force  one  should  read  all  of  pages  422-423,  and  all  of  the  twenty- 
fourth  chapter  of  Luke.  Tertullian  must  have  been  acquainted 
also  with  Matthew's  account,  for  on  page  676  he  quotes 
Matthew's  version  of  the  gr,eat  commission,  Matt.  28:19.  We 
also  find  him,  on  page  621,  quoting  the  words  of  Jesus  to  Mary 
Magdalene  after  his  resurrection  as  given  in  John  20:17.  Evi- 
dently he  must  have  been  familiar  with  John's  account  of  the 
resurrection. 

Let  us  read  from  pages  521  and  522,  bearing  in  mind  the 
doctrine  that  Tertullian  was  combating.  We  have  here  a 
remarkable  example  of  reference  as  forceful  as  direct  quotation: 


TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY         259 

"Marcion  in  order  that  he  might  deny  the  flesh  of  Christ, 
denied  also  his  nativity,  or  else  he  denied  his  flesh  in  order  that 
he  might  deny  his  nativity. —  Clearly  enough  is  the  nativity 
announced  by  Gabriel.  But  what  has  he  to  do  with  the 
Creator's  angel?  The  conception  in  the  Virgin's  womb  is 
plainly  set  forth  before  us.  But  what  concern  has  he  with 
the  Creator's  prophet  Isaiah?  He  will  not  brook  delay,  since 
suddenly  without  any  prophetic  announcement  did  he  bring 
Christ  down  from  heaven.  'Away,'  says  he  'with  that  eternal 
plaguy  taxing  of  Caesar,  and  the  scanty  inn  and  the  squalid 
swaddling  clothes  and  the  hard  stable.  We  do  not  care  a  jot 
for  that  multitude  of  the  heavenly  host  which  praised  their 
Lord  at  night.  Let  the  shepherds  take  better  care  of  their 
flocks,  and  let  the  wise  men  spare  their  legs  so  long  a  journey; 
let  them  keep  their  gold  to  themselves.  Let  Herod,  too, 
mend  his  manners  so  that  Jeremiah  may  not  glory  over  him. 
Spare  the  babe  also  from  circumcision  that  he  may  escape  the 
pain  thereof;  nor  let  him  be  brought  into  the  temple  lest  he 
burden  his  parents  with  the  expense  of  the  offerings.  Nor  let 
him  be  handed  to  old  Simeon  lest  the  old  man  be  saddened 
at  the  point  of  death.  Let  that  old  woman  also  hold  her 
tongue  lest  she  should  bewitch  the  child.'"  Tertullian  then 
continues  in  reply:  "After  such  a  fashion  as  this,  O  Marcion, 
I  suppose  you  have  had  the  hardihood  of  blotting  out  the 
original  records  of  the  history  of  Christ,  that  his  flesh  may  lose 
the  proofs  of  its  reality.  But  on  what  grounds  do  you  do  this? 
Show  me  your  authority.  If  you  are  a  prophet,  foretell  us  a 
thing;  if  you  are  an  Apostle,  open  your  message  in  public;  if 
a  follower  of  the  Apostles,  side  with  the  Apostles  in  thought. 
If  you  are  only  a  private  Christian,  believe  what  has  been 
handed  down  to  us.  If,  however,  you  are  nothing  of  all  these 
(as  I  have  the  best  reason  to  say)  cease  to  live.  For,  indeed, 
you  are  already  dead,  since  you  are  no  Christian,  because  you 
do  not  believe  that  which  by  being  believed  makes  men  Chris- 
tian." Reading  this  summary  of  Marcion's  teaching,  one  can 
almost  imagine  himself  reading  a  magazine  article  by  one  of 
our  modern  "liberal"  theologians;  reading  Tertullian's  reply 


260  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

he  can  fancy  himself  listening  to  the  answer  by  an  "orthodox" 
divine.  At  this  point  we  are  not  at  all  interested  in  the  merits 
of  the  controversy.  We  are  not  concerned  at  this  time  with 
the  credibility  of  the  story  of  the  "Virgin  birth"  but  with  its 
antiquity.  We  are  simply  following  back  the  Gospel  story  in 
order  to  find  when,  if  at  all,  it  has  received  the  accretions 
which  it  has  been  charged  have  attached  to  the  original.  The 
accepted  story  of  the  nativity  is  one  of  the  portions  most 
frequently  named  by  critics  as  being  legendary.  But  if  so  it  is 
clear  that  the  legend  makers  had  done  their  work  and  "  escaped  " 
before  the  time  of  Tertullian,  as  in  this  particular  nothing  has 
been  added  since  his  time.  To  Tertullian  the  accounts  of 
Matthew  and  Luke  are  parts  of  "what  has  been  handed  down 
to  us."  More  than  this,  such  legend  corruption  must  have 
antedated  the  time  of  Marcion.  Each  item  in  the  accounts  of 
Matthew  and  Luke,  as  we  have  seen,  he  holds  up  to  derision. 
He  attacks  their  credibility  as  inconsistent  with  his  philosophy, 
but  does  not  question  their  antiquity  or  apostolic  origin. 
Evidently  these  passages  were  universally  conceded  portions 
of  Matthew  and  Luke  in  his  day. 

It  is  clear  that  Tertullian  was  familiar  with  a  collection  of 
books  essentially  those  of  our  New  Testament.  It  is  also  clear 
that  he  does  not  show  any  knowledge  of  any  other  and  older 
story  of  the  origin  of  Christianity  than  that  contained  in  the 
four  Gospels.  He  believes  that  it  is  the  original  and  apostolic 
account.  If  we  suppose  that  "x"  is  not  the  same  as  "a"  but 
that  "x"  has  given  place  to  "a"  either  by  means  of  a  forgery 
or  by  legendary  growth  at  any  time  after  Tertullian's  coming 
to  years  of  understanding,  we  must  believe  that  he  would 
have  observed  the  commotion  which  a  change  would  surely 
have  created  in  church  circles.  If  we  suppose  that,  as  a  boy, 
he  had  learned  "x,"  we  cannot  suppose  him  after  he  was 
fifteen  years  old  to  have  received  a  different  story  and  to  have 
believed  it  to  be  the  original  apostolic  story.  There  is  another 
circumstance  worthy  to  be  mentioned  here.  Clement  and 
Tertullian  belong  pratically  to  the  same  period.  We  prove 
little  by  one  which  is  not  proven  by  the  other.  But  is  it  not 


TRACING  BACK  THE   GOSPEL  STORY        261 

an  important  circumstance  that  they  represent  such  widely 
separated  churches?  Clement  is  at  Alexandria,  Tertullian  is 
at  Rome  and  Carthage.  If  there  are  legendary  accretions 
to  the  original  story,  these  legends  have  grown  at  the  same 
rate  in  these  widely  separated  places  and  have  not  grown  by 
the  addition  of  a  single  incident  since.  There  was  at  this 
time  no  central  authority  to  enforce  uniformity  in  either 
doctrine  or  practice,  and  yet  during  the  ministry  of  Clement 
and  Tertullian  we  have  this  Gospel  story  "a"  accepted  and 
believed  to  be  of  apostolic  origin,  by  the  churches  at  Carthage, 
Rome,  and  Alexandria.  Not  only  so,  but  whatever  of  discord 
may  have  attended  the  substitution  of  "a"  for  "x"  has  sub- 
sided, and  although  the  churches  are  rent  by  fierce  disputes 
over  many  things  there  remains  absolutely  no  trace  of  a  story 
earlier  than  "a"  or  differing  from  it  in  the  slightest  particular. 
Further,  we  find  Tertullian  holding  up  for  the  scorn  of  the 
Christian  church,  the  heretic  Marcion  (who  was  a  teacher  at 
Rome  about  A.D.  140).  He  charges  him  with  having  mutilated 
the  Gospel  of  Luke,  and  with  having  ignored  or  rejected  the 
other  Gospels.  They  must  have  existed  in  Marcion's  time, 
else  he  could  not  have  been  thus  subject  to  censure.  We 
believe  there  would  be  warrant  on  the  examination  of  Ter- 
tullian for  asserting  that  our  present  Gospels  existed  in  their 
present  form  in  the  churches  in  A.  D.  140,  but  as  we  have  two 
other  witnesses  by  whom  we  expect  to  show  an  even  greater 
age  for  them,  we  will  at  present  only  carry  "a"  back  to  a  time 
for  which  Tertullian' s  testimony  is  an  unquestionable  voucher, 
say  to  A.  D.  160. 


CHAPTER  XV 
TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY  —  CONTINUED 

OUR  next  author  is  Irenaeus.  This  man  was  born  in  Syria, 
probably  about  the  year  one  hundred  and  twenty  of  our  era. 
In  early  life  he  was  a  disciple  of  Polycarp  at  Smyrna,  and  after- 
ward was  sent  by  him  as  a  missionary  to  Gaul,  where  he  was 
associated  with  Pothinus  at  Lyons,  and  on  the  death  of  Pothinus 
in  A.  D.  177  he  became  bishop  of  that  see,  and  held  that  office 
until  his  death  near  the  close  of  that  century.  His  writings 
are  not  as  numerous  as  those  of  Tertullian  or  of  Origen,  but 
they  are  of  intense  interest.  His  principal  work  is  usually 
referred  to  as  "Irenaeus  against  Heresies,"  but  he  did  not  give 
it  that  title.  He  called  his  work  "A  Refutation  of  Knowledge 
Falsely  So-called."  He  quotes  from  each  of  the  Gospels:  from 
Matthew,  one  hundred  and  eighty-two  times  from  twenty- 
eight  chapters;  from  Mark,  eighteen  times  from  eleven  chapters; 
from  Luke,  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  times  from  twenty-two 
chapters;  and  from  John,  eighty-seven  times  from  eighteen 
chapters.  He  also  quotes  from  the  Acts  and  from  every 
Epistle  except  Philemon.  The  following  are  sample  quotations 
from  Matthew,  Mark,  and  John: 

Page  422  —  Matt.  3 :;  Page  442  —  Mark  8:31 

423  —  Matt.  2:2  "  446  —  Matt.  16:13-17 

426  —  Mark  16:19  "  539  —  John  5:28-29 
423  —  John  2:25  "  547  —  John  1:12-13 

427  —  Johni:6  560  —  Matt.  8:11 
427  —  John  1:14  "  560  —  John  20:17 
441  —  Mark  1:1 

We  have  purposely  omitted  quotations  from  Luke  from  this 
list  because  we  wished  to  make  Irenaeus'  use  of  that  Gospel  a 
matter  of  special  consideration.  In  our  discussion  of  Tertullian 
we  learned  that  the  heretic  Marcion  was  charged  with  mutilating 
the  Gospel  of  Luke  and  with  the  rejection  of  the  others.  It 

262 


TRACING  BACK  THE   GOSPEL   STORY         263 

would  seem  that  in  the  time  of  Irenaeus  there  were  those  who 
depreciated  Luke  because  he  was  not  one  of  the  twelve.    There 
is  a  chapter  in  which  he  argues  with  such  persons  that  we 
wish  to  read,  for  although  there  are  but  few  direct  quotations, 
the  references  to  incidents  recorded  by  Luke  alone  are  so  plain 
and  numerous  that  this  one  chapter  alone  will  prove  beyond 
question  that  the  Gospel  of  Luke  existed  even  then  in  its 
present  form.     We  quote  Vol.  i ,  Chapter  3  on  page  438 :     "Now 
if  any  man  set  Luke  aside  as  one  who  did  not  know  the  truth, 
he  will  manifestly  reject  that  Gospel  of  which  he  claims  to  be 
a  disciple,  for  through  him  we  have  become  acquainted  with 
very  many  and  important  parts  of  the  Gospel:    for  instance 
the  generation  of  John,  the  history  of  Zacharias,  the  coming 
of  the  angel  to  Mary,  the  exclamation  of  Elizabeth,  the  descent 
of  the  angel  to  the  shepherds,  the  words  spoken  by  them,  the 
testimony  of  Anna  and  of  Simeon  with  regard  to  the  Christ, 
and  that  at  twelve  years  of  age  he  was  left  behind  at  Jerusalem. 
Also  the  baptism  of  John,  the  number  of  our  Lord's  years 
when  he  was  baptized,  and  that  this  occurred  in  the  fifteenth 
year  of  Tiberius  Caesar.     And  in  his  office  as  teacher,  this  is 
what  he  said  to  the  rich:    'Woe  unto  you  that  are  rich  for  ye 
have  received  your  consolation'  and  'Woe  unto  you  that  are 
full  for  ye  shall  hunger,  and  to  you  that  laugh  now  for  ye  shall 
weep '  and  '  Woe  unto  you  when  all  men  shall  speak  well  of  you, 
for  so  did  your  fathers  of  the  false  prophets.'     All  things  of 
the  following  kind,  we  have  known  through  Luke  alone  (and 
numerous  actions  of  the  Lord,  we  have  learned  through  him, 
which  also  the  other  evangelists  notice):    the   multitude  of 
fishes  which  Peter's  companions  enclosed  when  at  the  Lord's 
command  they  cast  the  nets;  the  woman  who  had  suffered 
eighteen  years  and  was  healed  on  the  Sabbath  say;  the  man 
who  had  the  dropsy  and  whom  the  Lord  made  whole  on  the 
sabbath;  and  how  he  did  defend  himself  for  having  performed 
an  act  of  healing  on  that  day;  how  he  taught  his  disciples  not 
to  aspire  to  the  uppermost  rooms;  how  we  should  invite  the 
poor  and  feeble  who  cannot  recompense  us;  the  man  who 
knocked  during  the  night  to  obtain  loaves  and  did  obtain  them 


264  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

because  of  the  urgency  of  his  importunity;  how  when  our  Lord 
was  sitting  at  meat  with  a  Pharisee,  a  woman  that  was  a  sinner 
kissed  his  feet  and  anointed  them  with  ointment,  with  what 
the  Lord  said  to  Simon  on  her  behalf  concerning  the  two 
debtors;  also  about  the  rich  man  who  stored  up  the  goods  that 
had  accrued  to  him,  to  whom  it  was  also  said:  'This  night 
they  shall  demand  thy  soul  from  thee,  whose  then  shall  all 
those  things  be  which  thou  hast  prepared?'  And  similar  to 
this  that  of  the  rich  man  who  was  clothed  in  purple  and  who 
fared  sumptuously,  and  the  indigent  Lazarus;  also  the  answer 
which  he  gave  his  disciples  when  they  said  '  Increase  our  faith' ; 
also  his  conversation  with  Zacheus  the  Publican;  also  about  the 
Pharisee  and  the  Publican  who  were  praying  in  the  temple 
at  the  same  time;  also  the  ten  lepers  whom  he  cleansed  in  the 
way  simultaneously;  also  how  he  ordered  the  lame  and  the 
blind  to  be  gathered  to  the  wedding  from  the  lanes  and  streets; 
also  the  parable  of  the  judge  who  feared  not  God  whom  the 
widow's  importunity  led  to  avenge  her  cause;  and  about  the 
fig  tree  in  the  vineyard  which  produced  no  fruit.  There  are 
also  many  other  particulars  to  be  found  mentioned  by  Luke 
alone,  which  are  made  use  of  by  both  Marcion  and  Valetinus. 
And  besides  all  these  he  records  what  Christ  said  to  his  dis- 
ciples in  the  way,  after  his  resurrection,  and  how  they  recog- 
nized him  in  breaking  bread.  It  follows  then,  of  course,  that 
these  men  must  either  receive  the  rest  of  his  narrative  or  else 
reject  these  parts  also;  for  no  persons  of  common  sense  can 
permit  them  to  receive  some  things  recounted  by  Luke  as 
being  true  and  set  others  aside  as  if  he  had  not  known  the 
truth." 

We  are  confident  that  this  quotation  by  itself  will  be  con- 
ceded as  showing  that  the  Gospel  of  Luke,  in  its  present  form, 
existed  in  the  time  of  Irenaeus.  Further  there  is  raised  a  very 
strong  presumption  that  the  form  of  the  other  Gospels  was 
already  fixed,  for  had  they  taken  shape  at  a  later  date  it  would 
seem  strange  that  they  should  not  include  more  of  the  things 
which  Irenaeus  says  we  learn  "from  Luke  alone."  It  will  be 
observed  also  that  Irenaeus  names  these  as  some  of  the  things 


TRACING  BACK  THE   GOSPEL  STORY        265 

which  are  received  by  both  Marcion  and  Valetinus,  and  the 
list  includes  several  of  the  incidents  most  likely  to  be  attacked 
as  legendary,  such  as  the  cleansing  of  the  ten  lepers,  the  Virgin 
birth,  and  the  resurrection.  Evidently  these  things  were  in 
the  accepted  record  even  in  the  time  of  these  "critics."  We 
should  remember  that  Irenaeus  is  so  near  the  apostolic  age 
that  tradition  would  be  of  great  service  in  frustrating  any 
attempt,  had  one  been  made,  to  corrupt  the  accepted  history. 
There  is  only  one  step  between  Irenaeus  and  the  apostle  John 
and  that  is  filled  by  his  teacher  and  master  Polycarp.  Indeed 
we  have  reached  a  point  in  our  investigation  where  we  face 
not  so  much  the  hypothesis  of  unconscious  accretions  to  the 
Gospel  story,  as  the  possibility  of  deliberate  fraud.  Irenaeus 
professes  to  teach  the  Gospel  as  Polycarp  taught  him.  If 
this  be  not  the  original  story  taught  by  John  the  Apostle, 
Polycarp  must  have  been  guilty  of  fraud.  We  have  found 
Irenaeus  quoting  freely  from  a  work  which  corresponds  to  our 
Gospel  according  to  John,  and  which  he  ascribes  to  John  the 
Apostle.  If  this  contained  a  different  story  from  that  which 
Polycarp  had  received  by  word  of  mouth  from  John,  how  strange 
that  he  should  not  inform  the  young  Irenaeus. 

Justin,  surnamed  the  Martyr,  was  a  native  of  Palestine. 
We  are  uncertain  as  to  the  time  of  his  birth.  The  date  of  his 
death  is  undisputed.  An  old  man,  he  falls  a  victim  to  perse- 
cution and  is  beheaded  in  A.  D .  1 6 5 .  We  certainly  are  warranted 
in  concluding  that  he  was  born  not  later  than  the  beginning  of 
that  century.  His  father  was  a  heathen;  Justin  embraced  the 
philosophy  of  Plato,  but  was  converted  to  Christianity  as  a 
result  of  a  conversation  which  he  had  with  an  aged  Christian 
whom  he  met  in  his  solitary  rambles.  He  himself  gives  us  an 
interesting  account  of  this  interview.  His  principal  works  are: 
(i)  The  Dialogue  with  Trypho,  in  which  there  is  set  forth  the 
argument  of  Christian  with  the  Jew  of  that  time.  (2)  The 
Apology,  addressed  to  the  Emperor  Antoninus  Pius  in  defense 
of  the  Christians  then  suffering  persecution. 

He  quotes  from  each  of  the  Gospels  though  not  so  frequently 
as  Irenaus  as  his  works  are  not  so  extensive.  He  refers  to  forty- 


266 


STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 


three  passages  in  Matthew,  three  in  Mark,  nineteen  in  Luke 
and  five  in  John.  He  professes  to  make  these  quotations  from 
the  "Memoirs  of  our  Lord  which  have  been  recorded  by  the 
Apostles."  He  quotes  also  from  Acts,  Romans,  First  Corin- 
thians, Gallatians,  II  Thessalonians,  Hebrews,  I  Peter, 
II  Peter,  and  Revelation.  The  criticism  has  sometimes  been 
made  that  the  quotations  by  Justin  are  not  always  exact. 
This  is  true.  Indeed  they  often  remind  us  of  the  efforts  of  a 
modern  preacher  to  quote  from  memory.  The  following  cita- 
tions leave  in  our  minds  no  doubt  of  his  familiarity  with  these 
books. 


VOL.  i 


Page  167  —  Matt.  9:13 
168  — Matt.  6:19 
1 68  —  Mark  12:30 
168  —  Matt.  22:17-21 
183  —  John  3 :5 
203  —  Matt.  21:13 
212  —  Matt.  7:15 
212  — Matt.  24:11 
219  —  Matt.  3:11-12 
236  —  Matt.  7:22 
236  —  Matt.  25:41 


Page  236  —  Luke  10:19 
237  —  Luke  9:22 
246  —  Matt.  22  137-39 
2      —  Luke  6: 


247 


. 

Luke  6:35 
249  —  Luke  i  :38 
249  —  Matt.  11:27 

251  —  Luke  22:42-44 

252  —  Luke  23:46 
252  —  Matt.  5:20 
252  —  Matt.  12:38-39 


There  are  many  other  places  where  the  verbiage  is  altogether 
that  of  Justin  himself,  no  attempt  being  made  to  give  the  words 
of  another,  but  which  are  as  forceful  as  the  most  exact  quota- 
tion could  be  in  showing  the  contents  of  the  Christian  story  at 
that  time.  We  cite  a  few  of  these,  and  will  ask  the  reader  to 
observe  the  perfectly  commonplace  manner  in  which  he  refers 
to  some  of  the  things  most  frequently  suspected  of  being  of 
legendary  origin. 

In  chapter  10,  page  199  we  read:  "Is  there  any  other 
matter,  my  friends,  in  which  we  are  blamed  than  this;  that  we 
live  not  after  the  law,  and  are  not  circumcised  in  the  flesh,  as 
your  fathers  were,  and  do  not  observe  the  sabbaths  as  you  do?" 
"This  is  what  we  are  amazed  at,"  said  Trypho,  "but  those  things 
of  which  the  multitude  speak,  they  are  not  worthy  of  belief, 
for  they  are  repugnant  to  human  nature.  Moreover,  I  am 
aware  that  your  precepts  in  the  so-called  Gospels  are  so  wonder- 


TRACING  BACK  THE   GOSPEL  STORY        267 

f ul  and  so  great  that  I  suspect  no  one  can  keep  them  for  I  have 
carefully  read  them."  We  have  quoted  this  paragraph,  among 
other  reasons,  to  overcome  in  some  degree  the  confusion  arising 
from  the  fact  that  Justin  quotes  from  what  he  calls  the 
"Memoirs"  passages  which  we  find  in  our  New  Testament 
Gospels.  In  this  paragraph  we  see  that  the  term  Gospels 
was  even  then  applied  to  the  Christian's  sacred  books,  and 
under  that  name  the  Jew  Trypho  had  read  them.  The  Gospels 
and  Justin's  "Memoirs"  are  evidently  identical.  It  would 
seem  that  at  the  time  of  Justin  both  words  were  in  use  as  titles 
of  the  monographs  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and  John  and 
with  the  lapse  of  years  the  term  Gospels  has  survived  in  the 
usage  of  the  churches  and  the  term  Memoirs  has  simply  passed 
out  of  use. 

Let  us  now  turn  to  page  203,  chapter  17. —  "For  after 
you  had  crucified  him,  the  only  blameless  and  righteous  man, 
through  whose  stripes  those  who  approach  the  Father  by  him 
are  healed, —  when  you  knew  he  had  risen  from  the  dead  and 
ascended  to  heaven,  as  the  prophets  foretold  he  would,  you 
not  only  did  not  repent  of  the  wickedness  which  you  had  com- 
mitted, but  at  that  time  you  selected  and  sent  out  from 
Jerusalem  chosen  men  to  publish  those  things  which  those 
who  know  us  not  speak  against  us."  Observe  that  the  story 
of  the  resurrection  is  extant  and  that  Justin  charges  that  the 
Jew  "knew  that  he  had  risen  from  the  dead"  It  is  such  a  matter 
of  common  knowledge  that  Justin,  in  his  argument  with  Trypho, 
does  not  think  it  worth  while  to  spend  words  in  an  attempt 
to  prove  it.  He  simply  reiterates  the  charge  that  the  Jew 
knew  it  was  so.  To  the  same  import  we  read  on  pages  252-253, 
"And  that  he  would  rise  again  on  the  third  day  after  his  cruci- 
fixion, it  is  written  in  the  memoirs  that  some  of  your  nation 
questioning  him  said  'show  us  a  sign'  and  he  replied,  'An  evil 
and  adulterous  generation  seeketh  after  a  sign,  and  no  sign 
shall  be  given  them  save  the  sign  of  Jonah.'"  This  is  a  good 
example  of  the  freedom  with  which  Justin  makes  his  quotations, 
but  who  would  question  but  that  he  had  in  mind  Matthew 
12:38-40?  Justin  then  continues:  "Yet  you  not  only  have 


268  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

not  repented  after  you  learned  that  he  rose  from  the  dead,  bul 
as  I  said  before  you  have  sent  chosen  men  throughout  all  the 
world  to  proclaim  that  a  godless  heresy  had  sprung  up  from 
one  Jesus,  whom  we  crucified;  but  his  disciples  stole  him  by 
night  from  the  tomb  where  he  was  laid  when  unfastened  from 
the  cross  and  now  deceive  men  by  asserting  that  he  had  risen 
from  the  dead  and  ascended  to  heaven."  Evidently  in  the 
time  of  Justin,  the  Jews  had  found  no  other  method  of  account- 
ing for  the  disappearance  of  the  body  of  Jesus  than  that 
which  Matthew  ascribes  to  them  on  that  first  Easter  Sunday 
morning. 

On  page  174  we  read:  "And  hear  again  how  Isaiah  in 
express  words  foretold  that  he  should  be  born  of  a  virgin: 
'  Behold  a  virgin  shall  conceive  and  bring  forth  a  son,  and  they 
shall  say  for  his  name,  God  with  us'  ....  And  the 
angel  of  God  who  was  sent  to  the  virgin  brought  her  good  news 
saying:  'Behold  thou  shalt  conceive  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and 
shalt  bear  a  son  and  he  shall  be  called  the  son  of  the  Highest, 
and  thou  shalt  call  his  name  Jesus  for  he  shall  save  his  people 
from  their  sins,'  as  they  who  have  recorded  all  things  con- 
cerning our  Savior  have  taught,  whom  we  have  believed. 
.  .  .  .  It  is  wrong,  therefore,  to  understand  the  spirit  and 
power  of  God  as  anything  else  than  the  Word,  who  is  also  the 
First-born  of  God  .  .  .  and  it  was  this  which  when  it 
came  upon  the  virgin  and  overshadowed  her  caused  her  to 
conceive,  not  by  intercourse  but  by  power"  If  the  story  of 
the  Virgin  birth  is  a  legendary  accretion  the  legend  makers 
had  done  their  work  before  the  time  of  Justin. 

We  will  give  one  more  paragraph,  clearly  establishing  the 
identity  of  Justin's  " Memoirs"  with  the  Gospels.  On  page 
185  he  writes  of  the  Eucharist:  "For  not  as  common  bread 
and  common  drink  do  we  receive  these  .  .  .  for  the 
Apostles  in  the  Memoirs  composed  by  them  which  are  called 
Gospels,  have  thus  delivered  unto  us  what  was  enjoined  upon 
them;  that  Jesus  took  bread,  and  when  he  had  given  thanks 
said:  'this  do  ye  in  remembrance  of  me;  this  is  my  body'; 
and  that  after  the  same  manner,  having  taken  the  cup  and 


TRACING  BACK  THE  GOSPEL  STORY         269 

given  thanks,  he  said:    'This  is  my  blood'  and  gave  it  to 
them  alone.'" 

We  conclude  that  the  story  which  Justin  Martyr  had 
received  of  the  birth,  ministry,  death,  and  resurrection  of  Jesus 
did  not  differ  materially  from  that  contained  in  our  New 
Testament  Gospels;  that  it  had  already  been  reduced  to  writing 
in  the  four  forms  in  which  it  appears  to-day  and  that  Justin 
and  the  Christians  of  his  time  ascribed  it  to  Apostolic  author- 
ship. 


CHAPTER  XVI 
HYPOTHESIS  OF  LEGENDARY  GROWTH  —Concluded 

WITH  Justin  Martyr  we  close  our  quotations  from  the  Ante- 
Nicene  Fathers.  We  stop  here  because  we  do  not  wish  to 
appeal  to  any  disputed  authority.  There  are  extant  certain 
epistles  accredited  to  Ignatius  and  Polycarp  (Vol.  I,  page  33) 
which  contain  numerous  New  Testament  quotations,  and  very 
clear  assumptions  of  the  essential  incidents  of  the  Gospel  story. 
There  is  also  a  fragment  accredited  to  one  Papias,  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  first  century,  which  mentions  by  name  the  Gospels 
of  Matthew  and  Mark  as  having  been  written  by  those  men: 
that  Matthew  wrote  his  Gospel  first  in  Hebrew;  that  Mark 
wrote  the  one  bearing  his  name  at  the  dictation  of  Peter. 
This  testimony  would  be  very  important,  and  would  clearly 
put  the  writing  of  our  present  Gospels  in  the  age  of  the  Apostles. 
But  unfortunately  the  genuineness  of  these  epistles  and  frag- 
ments has  sometimes  been  called  in  question.  We,  therefore, 
choose  to  throw  them  "out  of  court,"  and  to  see  what  con- 
clusions are  warranted  by  the  examination  so  far  made. 

(1)  Justin  Martyr,  before  the  middle  of  the  second  century, 
had  in  his  possession  a  collection  of  books  substantially  those  of 
the  present  New  Testament,  and  containing  the  four  Gospels  in 
their  present  form.  These  were  accounted  of  apostolic  authority. 

(2)  The  Gospels  in  the  hands  of  Justin  Martyr  contained 
in  every  essential  particular  the  story  of  the  birth,  ministry, 
death,  and  resurrection  of  Jesus,  as  it  exists  in  our  New  Testa- 
ment to-day.    There  is  no  reason  to  think  that  "  legend  making  " 
has  added  anything  to  the  Gospel  story  since  the  manhood  of 
Justin  Martyr,  say,  A.D.  120  or  125,  and  we  are  fully  warranted 
in  moving  "a"  in  our  diagram  back  to  the  latter  date. 

(3)  If  the  present  Gospel  story  is  of  legendary  origin,  it  is 
the  growth  of  a  very  short  period;  of  not  more  than  fifty  years; 

270 


HYPOTHESIS  OF  LEGENDARY  GROWTH      271 

from  A.D.  75  to  A.D.  125.  Justin  Martyr  and  the  men  of  his 
time  received  the  Gospel  story  from  men  who  had  received  it 
from  the  Apostles.  These  men  —  the  preachers  of  the  period 
of  fifty  years,  from  A.D.  75  to  A.D.  125  had  received  the  original 
Gospel  story  which  we  designated  by  "x."  They  gave  to  their 
hearers  the  present  Gospel  story  "a."  Whatever  changes 
were  made  must  have  been  consciously  made.  Suppose  that 
the  Gospel,  as  preached  by  the  Apostles  did  not  contain  the 
accounts  of  the  incarnation  and  of  the  resurrection.  We  have 
found  both  Irenaeus  and  Justin  quoting  those  accounts  from 
the  "Scriptures"  extant  in  their  day  and  affirming  that  these 
were  portions  of  the  story  as  they  had  been  taught.  If  these 
portions  were  not  part  of  the  original  story,  they  had  been 
inserted  during  the  fifty  years  we  have  indicated  and  by  the 
preachers  of  that  period;  and  if  so  those  preachers  knew  they 
were  perpetrating  a  fraud,  and  imposing  a  forgery  on  the 
church.  We  are  forever  through  with  the  "Hypothesis  of 
Legendary  Accretion."  As  a  hypothetical  possibility,  we  say, 
the  church  of  the  closing  years  of  the  first  century  and  the 
opening  years  of  the  second  century  may  have  been  forgery 
duped;  it  was  not,  it  could  not,  have  been  legend  duped. 

It  is  next  in  order  to  consider  the  probability  of  such  men 
as  those  teachers  and  preachers,  perpetrating  such  a  fraud,  and 
the  further  probability  of  the  church,  of  that  time  and  at  that 
time  being  deceived  by  it  had  such  a  thing  been  attempted. 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  FORGERY 

WE  are  next  to  inquire  into  the  probability  that  the  present 
Gospel  story  is  a  forgery  palmed  of!  on  the  church  some  time 
between  A.D.  75  and  A.D.  125.  That  we  may  not  be  unneces- 
sarily burdened,  let  us  narrow  the  question  to  one  particular: 
Was  the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  forged  and  incor- 
porated into  the  record  during  the  period  named?  If  so  no 
Christian  would  have  any  heart  to  insist  on  the  integrity  of 
any  other  part  of  the  record.  If  it  is  genuine,  and  a  part  of 
the  original  story  as  first  preached,  no  critic  would  care  to 
insist  on  the  corruption  of  any  other  portion. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  we  did  not  propose  to  prove  the 
integrity  of  the  Gospel  story  beyond  the  possibility  of  a  doubt, 
but  beyond  a  reasonable  doubt.  It  is  possible  to  doubt  the 
battle  of  Thermopylae  having  been  fought;  to  suggest  that  the 
story  of  Leonidas  and  his  Spartans  is  a  fiction  invented  by 
national  vanity.  But  such  a  supposition  is  more  unreasonable 
than  the  story  which  is  questioned. 

Conceding  for  the  purposes  of  this  discussion  that  it  is 
hypothetically  possible  that  the  story  of  the  resurrection  was  a 
forgery  thrust  into  the  record  during  the  fifty  years  under 
consideration,  let  us  look  at  the  implications  of  the  hypothesis 
and  the  dimensions  of  the  fraud.  The  theory  of  forgery,  like 
the  theory  of  legendary  accretion,  supposes  the  story  of  the 
resurrection  to  be  no  part  of  the  original  story  "x"  which  the 
Apostles  of  Jesus  went  everywhere  preaching.  The  first 
story  was  simply  that  of  a  devout  young  Jew  who  went  about 
teaching  sublime  moral  maxims,  and  doing  deeds  of  mercy, 
who  at  last  was  apprehended  by  the  priests,  charged  with 
treason,  condemned  by  Pontius  Pilate,  suffered  on  the  cross 
between  two  thieves,  died,  was  buried  and  rotted.  His  disciples 

272 


THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  FORGERY      273 

had  trusted  "that  it  had  been  he  who  should  redeem  Israel"; 
and  so  after  his  death  they  go  everywhere  calling  on  men  to 
repent  of  their  sins,  and  to  believe  on  this  shamefully  mis- 
treated and  dead  Jew  whose  body,  still  lying  in  Joseph's  tomb 
or  some  other  resting  place,  is  like  all  others  rapidly  passing  to 
dust.  The  Apostles  of  Jesus  never  said  that  he  rose  from  the 
dead.  They  preach  a  dead  Redeemer.  Yet  marvelous  success 
attends  their  preaching,  and  before  the  year  seventy-five  of 
our  era,  Christian  congregations  are  found  as  far  east  as 
Mesopotamia,  thence  westward  in  Syria,  in  Egypt,  and 
Northwest  Africa,  in  Asia  Minor,  in  Greece,  in  Spain,  and  in 
Italy.  These  have  all  received  the  Gospel  story  with  the 
"supernatural"  element  omitted.  The  dead  Jesus  still  "sleeps 
with  his  fathers."  The  last  time  his  friends  saw  him  was  on 
that  Friday  evening  when  they  took  him  down  from  the  cross, 
closed  his  glazed  eyes,  "rolled  a  great  stone  to  the  door  of  the 
sepulcher,  and  departed."  No  one  of  the  first  generation  of 
Christians  ever  heard  of  the  resurrection,  but  at  some  time 
within  this  fifty  years  under  consideration  some  unknown 
somebodies  corrupt  the  simple  "Memoirs  of  the  Apostles." 
To  make  a  bigger  story,  they  declare  that  Jesus  only  lay  in 
the  grave  from  Friday  evening  until  Sunday  morning.  Straight- 
way from  Babylon  to  Rome  the  preachers,  including  Ignatius 
and  Polycarp,  are  telling  the  story  of  a  risen  Jesus,  and  assert 
that  the  Apostles  had  told  it  so  from  the  beginning.  This 
story  is  received  with  avidity  by  the  Christians.  And  now 
another  thing  occurs  which  has  added  to  the  mystification  of 
all  succeeding  centuries.  The  written  "Memoirs"  of  the 
Apostles  must  be  changed  to  fit  this  latest  metamorphosis  of 
the  Gospel  story,  and  so  some  unknown  hands  add  to  each 
one  of  these  memoirs  a  chapter  or  two  containing  an  account 
of  the  resurrection;  and  to  increase  the  marvel  and  make  the 
work  consistent,  passages  are  inserted  in  which  Jesus  is  made 
to  predict  his  own  resurrection.  But  the  most  audacious 
thing  in  the  line  of  literary  fraud  ever  perpetrated  occurs. 
With  Jews  all  around  them  they  add  and  forthwith  preach  a 
story  of  the  conduct  of  the  Jews  at  the  time  of  the  death  and 


274  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

purported  resurrection  of  Jesus  (Matt.  27:62-66  and  Matt. 
28:11-15).  For  the  first  time  they  boldly  assert  in  the  face 
of  the  Jews  the  story  of  the  bribed  guard,  etc.,  and  yet  there 
is  no  record  that  any  Jew  ever  rose  to  say:  "We  never  heard 
that  before."  But  the  work  of  these  forgers  is  not  yet  done. 
Luke,  the  Christian  physician  and  companion  of  Paul,  had 
left  a  leaflet  purporting  to  give  an  account  of  part  of  the  ministry 
of  Peter  and  Paul  in  the  places  whither  they  went  preaching 
the  new  faith.  This  account  must  be  changed  to  fit  the  new 
version  of  the  story;  and  so  there  were  inserted  Acts  12:11, 
Acts  2:22-32,  Acts  3:15,  Acts  10:37-41,  Acts  13:26-30,  Acts 
17:30-31,  Acts  25:19,  Acts  26:22-23.  But  we  have  not  yet 
taken  in  the  magnitude  of  the  forgery  of  this  one  incident. 
There  was  a  collection  of  letters  of  the  Apostles  to  several 
churches.  No  critic  has  yet  been  bold  enough  to  deny  that 
Paul  did  write  a  letter  to  the  Romans,  two  to  the  Corinthians, 
and  some  others.  But  on  the  theory  we  are  considering, 
these  letters  could  have  contained  no  reference  to  the 
resurrection  of  Jesus;  and  for  the  sake  of  consistency  they 
too  must  be  changed  by  making  appropriate  insertions. 
Here  are  some  of  them:  in  Romans  1:4,  6:9,  8:11,  14:9, 
and  I  Cor.  15:1-8,  etc.  These  are  just  examples  of 
the  extent  of  the  forgery  which  by  hypothesis  must  have 
been  perpetrated  by  these  men.  And  this  work  is  so  thor- 
oughly done  and  is  so  readily  received  that  it  has  a  clear 
field  by  A.  D.  125.  If  there  was  any  protest  anywhere 
against  the  change,  it  was  so  feeble  that  every  trace  of  it, has 
perished  before  the  manhood  of  Justin  Martyr.  Neither 
Christian,  Jew  nor  Pagan  has  ever  claimed  to  be  able  to  point 
to  a  single  preacher  of  the  first  century  who  preached  anything 
but  a  risen  Jesus.  Once  more  we  insist  this  may  be  hypo- 
thetically  possible,  but  it  is  not  morally  probable. 

Evidently  the  hypothesis  of  forgery  of  so  important  an 
item  in  the  Gospel  records  implies  a  very  peculiar  class  of 
people  in  the  Christian  church  at  that  time.  Could  anything 
new  and  of  such  magnitude  be  inserted  into  the  record  now? 
To  suppose  that  it  could  be  done  then  implies  that  those  Chris? 


THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  FORGERY      275 

tians  cared  less  for  the  integrity  of  the  story  "x"  than  we  do 
for  "a."  The  period  was  one  of  bitter  persecution.  Men 
who  are  ready  to  die  for  their  faith  in  a  story  will  hold  it  uncor- 
rupted  tenaciously.  Tacitus  writing  of  the  efforts  of  Nero  to 
fasten  the  burning  of  Rome  on  the  Christians  says  (Annals, 
Book  XV,  Oxford  trans.):  "But  not  all  the  relief  that  could 
come  from  man,  not  all  the  bounties  the  prince  could  bestow, 
nor  all  the  atonements  which  could  be  presented  to  the  gods 
availed  to  relieve  Nero  of  the  infamy  of  being  believed  to 
have  ordered  the  conflagration.  Hence  to  suppress  the  rumor 
he  falsely  charged  with  the  guilt  and  punished  with  the  most 
exquisite  tortures  the  persons  commonly  called  Christians, 
who  were  hated  for  their  enormities.  Christus,  the  founder 
of  that  name,  was  put  to  death  as  a  criminal  by  Pontius  Pilate, 
Procurator  of  Judea  in  the  reign  of  Tiberius;  but  the  pernicious 
superstition,  repressed  for  a  time,  broke  out  again  not  only 
in  Judea,  where  the  mischief  originated,  but  through  the  city 
of  Rome  also,  whither  all  things  disgraceful  and  horrible 
flow  from  all  quarters,  as  to  a  common  receptable  and  where 
they  are  encouraged.  Accordingly,  first,  those  were  seized 
who  confessed  they  were  Christians;  next  on  their  information 
a  great  multitude  were  convicted,  not  so  much  on  the  charge 
of  burning  the  city  as  of  hating  the  human  race.  And  in 
their  deaths  they  were  also  made  the  subjects  of  sport  for 
they  were  covered  with  the  hides  of  wild  beasts  and  worried 
to  death  by  dogs,  or  nailed  to  crosses,  or  set  fire  to  for  nocturnal 
lights.  Nero  offered  his  own  garden  for  that  spectacle,  and 
exhibited  a  Circensian  game,  indiscriminately  mingling  with 
the  common  people  in  the  habit  of  his  charioteer  or  else  stand- 
ing in  his  chariot."  These  martyrs  had  received  the  story 
"x."  They  will  repeat  the  story  "x."  They  die  testifying 
their  faith  in  the  story  "x"  in  A.D.  64. 

Pass  on  one  generation  to  A.D.  no.  The  religious  teachers 
of  this  time  are  men  who  were  boys  when  Nero  was  lighting 
his  gardens  with  burning  Christians.  They  have  received 
the  story  "x."  Pliny,  the  younger,  is  governor  of  a  province 
in  Asia  Minor  and  it  becomes  his  official  duty  to  execute  the 


276  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

edicts  of  the  emperor  Trajan  for  the  extermination  of  Chris- 
tianity. He  is  appalled  at  the  magnitude  of  the  task  and 
reports  that  the  " crime  continues  to  spread"  notwithstanding 
the  persecutions.  He  is  "in  doubt  what  to  do  with  those  of 
tender  years."  He  has  found  that  an  "effectual  test  of  their 
crime  is  to  command  them  to  revile  the  name  of  Christ,  and 
to  make  sacrifice  to  the  image  of  the  emperor."  These  were 
things  that  those  "who  were  truly  Christians  could  not  be 
forced  to  do."  Aside  from  this  "stubbornness"  the  only 
"guilt"  he  "could  learn  from  those  who  turned  state's  evidence 
was  that  they  were  accustomed  to  meet  on  a  stated  day, 
before  it  was  light;  to  sing  in  concert  a  hymn  of  praise  to 
Christ  as  to  a  God;  and  to  bind  themselves  by  an  oath,  not  for 
the  perpetration  of  any  wickedness  but  that  they  would  not 
commit  any  theft,  robbery,  or  adultery,  nor  violate  their 
word  —  after  this  they  were  accustomed  to  separate,  and 
then  to  reassemble  to  eat  a  harmless  meal.  Even  this,  how- 
ever, they  ceased  to  do  after  my  edict,  in  which  agreeably 
with  your  command  I  forbade  the  meeting  of  secret  assemblies. 
After  hearing  this  I  thought  it  the  more  necessary  to  endeavor 
to  find  out  the  truth  by  putting  to  the  torture  two  female 
slaves  who  are  called  deaconesses.  But  I  could  discover 
nothing  but  a  perverse  and  extravagant  superstition,  and 
therefore  I  deferred  further  proceeding  until  I  should  hear 
from  you;  for  the  matter  seems  to  me  worthy  of  such  con- 
sideration on  account  of  the  number  of  those  who  are  involved 
in  peril;  for  many  of  every  age  and  of  either  sex  are  exposed, 
and  will  be  exposed  to  danger.  Nor  has  the  contagion  of  this 
superstition  been  confined  to  the  cities  only,  but  has  extended 
to  the  villages  and  even  to  the  country."  (Translation  by 
Prof.  Wright.)  Now  that  which  occurred  here  was  going  on 
all  over  the  Roman  world.  Pliny's  Christians  like  those  of 
Tacitus  had  a  story,  for  which  they  stood  ready  to  die.  Is  it 
"x"  or  "a"?  Think  a  moment.  These  people  are  of  every 
age.  Many  of  them  remember  the  days  and  the  persecution 
of  which  Tacitus  wrote.  They  had  received  the  story  "x." 
Think  again.  Justin  Martyr  is  a  boy.  These  people  are  most 


THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  FORGERY      277 

certainly  giving  out  the  story  which  he  received.  That  story 
we  have  seen  was  "a."  He  has  received  "x"  they  give 
"a."  Evidently  "x"  =  "a"  or  there  remains  but  one  alterna- 
tive. These  people  having  received  "x"  have  deliberately, 
unanimously,  by  common  consent,  from  the  Euphrates  to  the 
Straits  of  Gibralter,  changed  that  story  for  "a,"  have  obliter- 
ated all  trace  of  "x"  and  are  now  ready  to  die  by  torture 
rather  than  to  renounce  their  faith  in  "a."  Let  him  who 
can  believe  it.  It  would  be  a  greater  marvel  than  anything 
which  the  Christian  apologist  asks  men  to  believe.  No;  the 
Gospel  story  "a"  is  not  a  forgery;  "x"  =  "a." 

It  remains  for  us  to  consider  whether  the  first  teachers  of 
Christianity  were  either  deceivers  of  others  or  were  themselves 
the  victims  of  fraud  or  delusion.* 

*The  question  may  occur  to  some  minds  whether  the  Christians  of  the 
second  century  (like  Justin  and  Irenaeus  for  example)  were  able  to  assure 
themselves  that  the  story  which  they  received  from  their  preachers  was 
the  one  which  the  Apostles  had  told.  We  can  see  what  would  be  the 
facilities  for  detecting  a  forgery,  by  observing  the  accepted  history  of 
another  religious  movement  of  later  times,  e.g.,  of  the  people  called 
Methodists.  John  Wesley,  the  founder  of  this  sect,  was  born  in  A.D. 
1703  and  died  in  A.D.  1791.  At  the  time  of  this  writing,  A.  D.  1916,  we  are 
removed  from  the  time  of  his  birth  by  a  period  of  213  years,  a  period  of 
time  greater  than  that  which  separated  any  of  the  Ante-Nicene  fathers 
from  the  birth  of  Jesus  and  of  the  Apostle  John.  In  A.D.  213  evenOrigen 
was  over  twenty-eight  years  old.  Now  as  to  the  origin  of  the  people 
called  Methodists;  in  the  accepted  history  we  read:  "In  the  latter  end 
of  the  year  1739  eight  or  ten  persons  who  appeared  to  be  deeply  convicted 
of  sin  and  earnestly  groaning  for  redemption  came  to  Mr.  Wesley  in  London. 
They  desired,  as  did  two  or  three  more  the  next  day,  that  he  would  spend 
some  time  with  them  in  prayer  and  advise  them  how  to  flee  from  the  wrath 

to  come  which  they  saw  continually  hanging  over  their  heads,  etc 

This  was  the  rise  of  the  UNITED  SOCIETY,  first  in  Europe  and  then 
in  America."  This  quotation  is  from  the  preface  to  the  General  Rules  of 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  which  pastors  are  required  to  read  once 
a  year  in  every  congregation.  Can  we  have  evidence  that  this  is  an  uncor- 
rupted  account  of  the  origin  of  the  people  called  Methodists?  Let  us 
imagine  the  statement  challenged.  The  author  is  certain  that  it  is  the 
same  statement  he  has  heard  read  from  his  boyhood  and  is  convinced 
that  it  is  the  statement  made  in  regard  to  the  origin  of  the  Methodist 
Society  from  the  beginning.  He  remembers  distinctly  having  heard  these 
statements  read  by  Methodist  preachers  as  far  back  as  A.D.  1852.  He 
knew  at  that  time  at  least  two  men  who  had  been  preaching  fifty  years. 
He  remembers  the  names  of  these  two  and  how  they  looked  as  they  stood 
in  the  pulpit  "reading  the  General  Rules."  Of  course  there  were  many 


278  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

others  of  equal  age  in  the  ministry  whom  he  did  not  know.  They  were 
accustomed  to  read  these  statements  without  question.  He  never  heard 
their  Wesleyan  origin  questioned  by  any  one.  These  men  were  certainly 
able  to  have  corrected  the  error  if  it  had  been  such,  for  they  had  been 
ordained  by  Francis  Asbury,  who  as  will  be  remembered  was  Wesley's 
own  son  in  the  Gospel,  and  personal  friend  as  well,  and  was  sent  to  this 
country  before  the  Revolution,  and  organized  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  (certainly  on  a  Wesleyan  foundation)  in  A.D.  1784.  Besides  this 
there  were  living  and  known  to  the  author  quite  a  number  of  persons 
among  the  laity  of  the  church,  who  were  over  eighty  years  old;  and  some 
of  like  age  in  sects  violently  opposed  to  Methodism.  These  persons  could 
easily  remember  before  the  death  of  Wesley  (some  of  them  had  heard  him 
preach),  but  from  no  one  did  he  ever  hear  a  hint  that  there  was  any  other 
origin  of  the  sect  than  that  set  forth  in  the  generally  accepted  account. 
Every  one  will  agree  that  the  Methodists  of  the  author's  generation  were 
fully  justified  in  accepting  the  statement  quoted  as  the  original  account  of 
of  origin  of  "the  people  called  Methodists." 

Now  Justin,  dying  in  A.D.  165,  Tertullian  in  A.D.  240,  Clement  in  A.D. 
220,  and  Irenaeus  in  A.D.  202,  were  as  closely  related  to  the  origin  of  Chris- 
tianity as  is  the  author  to  the  origin  of  Methodism.  They  received  the 
Gospel  story  from  those  who  had  been  taught  it  by  the  Apostles  and  of 
such  there  were  a  sufficient  number  alive  to  have  prevented  collusion  in  a 
fraud  had  one  been  attempted. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 
HYPOTHESIS  OF  DELUSION  OR  IMPOSTURE 

Preliminary  Survey 

ASIDE  from  noting  that  Jesus  is  really  an  historic  personage— 
not  a  myth  —  we  have  established  but  one  fact.  But  from 
that  one  important  consequences  will  follow.  We  have  found 
that  the  story  which  we  now  have  in  the  four  Gospels  is  the 
original  one.  That  it  is  the  one  which  the  original  disciples 
of  Jesus  first  proclaimed.  There  is  not  a  particle  of  evidence 
that  a  single  incident  or  a  single  teaching  has  been  added  since 
the  last  one  of  the  Apostles  braved  exile  and  death  in  testimony 
that  "this  Jesus  hath  God  raised  up  whereof  we  are  witnesses." 
It  will  hereafter  be  allowable  to  examine  the  books  of  the 
New  Testament  in  our  effort  to  answer  the  remaining  questions 
of  our  investigation.  We  will  not  even  yet  quote  them  as 
authority  in  matters  of  doctrine.  We  simply  examine  them 
as  statements  of  fact  as  to  what  the  first  Christian  teaching 
was.  We  will  read  them  as  we  read  Xenophon's  Memorabilia, 
in  an  effort  to  determine  the  nature  of  the  Socratic  philosophy. 
We  will  read  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  as  to  the  first  preaching 
of  Christianity,  just  as  we  would  read  Caesar's  Commentaries 
on  the  Gallic  wars.  If  we  find  it  there  stated  that  Peter  and 
John  on  a  given  occasion  said  so  and  so,  we  will  conclude  that 
Peter  and  John  did  say  it,  but  we  will  grant  to  any  man  the 
right  to  determine  by  critical  inquiry  whether  Peter  and  John 
in  so  saying  told  the  truth  or  a  falsehood.  If  it  is  asked  what 
bearing  anything  we  here  find  may  have  on  the  question  yet 
before  us,  we  answer  that  on  the  hypothesis  of  either  fraud 
or  delusion  in  the  first  teachers  of  Christianity,  it  will  be  reason- 
able to  expect  something  in  their  work  that  will  bear  marks 
of  that  fraud,  or  of  that  delusion.  As  some  one  has  said: 
"A  design  to  deceive  is  itself  a  constraining  force.  An  effort 

279 


28o  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

to  make  a  consistent  story  is  likely  to  betray  itself  in  many 
places."  Again  on  the  hypothesis  that  Jesus  and  his  disciples 
were  deluded  enthusiasts,  we  ought  to  be  able  to  find  in  their 
work  some  indication  of  their  lack  of  mental  balance.  Note 
that  it  is  with  the  first  generation  of  Christian  teachers  that 
we  are  now  concerned;  with  those  who  told  the  story  on  their 
own  authority  as  eye  and  ear  witnesses.  The  world  has  had 
many  devotees  of  political,  philosophical  or  religious  theories 
who  were  ready  to  concoct  a  pleasing  fiction  and  pass  it  off 
for  the  truth.  But  so  far  as  we  have  investigated,  their  critics 
have  always  been  able  to  find  in  their  work  traces  of  the  motives 
that  swayed  them.  It  is  incumbent  on  any  one  who  would 
affirm  that  Jesus  and  his  Apostles  were  impostors  to  find  a 
motive  for  their  fraud.  Failing  to  find  it,  these  critics  are 
bound  in  reason  to  accord  them  the  presumption  of  sincerity. 
We  may  even  then  find  them  the  victims  of  mental  aberration, 
but  their  integrity  would  stand  unimpeached.  If  any  one 
affirms  that  Jesus  and  his  Apostles  were  insane  enthusiasts,  it 
is  incumbent  on  him  to  find  in  their  work  some  evidence  of 
their  aberration;  failing  to  find  it,  we  are  entitled  to  consider 
them  witnesses  of  sound  mind.  In  short,  in  the  absence  of 
evidence  of  fraudulent  purpose,  they  are  entitled  to  the  pre- 
sumption of  sincerity;  in  the  absence  of  evidence  of  mental 
aberration,  they  are  entitled  to  the  presumption  of  sanity. 


CHAPTER  XIX 
WAS  JESUS  AN  IMPOSTOR  OR  A  MADMAN? 

IT  seems  almost  superfluous  to  attempt  seriously  to  answer  the 
first  part  of  this  question.  It  is  true  that  Jesus  was  arrested 
as  an  evil  doer.  But  history  has  been  his  vindication.  The 
charges  against  him  were  two:  first  of  treason  against  the 
Roman  state,  and  of  this  his  accusers  failed  to  convince  the 
Roman  governor;  second  of  blasphemy,  and  those  who  would 
have  condemned  him  on  that  charge  were  prejudging  the  case 
and  begging  the  question.  His  impiety  was  said  to  consist 
in  his  claim  that  he  was  the  Son  of  God.  But  he  is  not  a 
blasphemer  in  so  claiming  if  the  claim  is  a  true  one.  Is  it  not 
remarkable  that  to-day  no  one  assails  the  integrity  of  Jesus? 
Pilate  voiced  the  judgment  of  all  future  generations  of  unbe- 
lievers when  he  said,  "I  find  no  fault  in  Him."  Infidel  and 
Jew  vie  with  the  Christian  in  eulogies  pronounced  on  the 
character  of  the  Nazarene.  Pilate,  Rosseau,  Chesterfield, 
Thomas  Paine,  Voltaire,  Herbert  Spencer,  John  Stuart  Mill, 
Renan,  Ingersoll,  Emma  Lazarus,  and  Rabbi  Hirsh  have  all 
uttered  words  in  which  may  be  read  the  fulfillment  of  the 
Apostolic  declaration  that:  "God  hath  highly  exalted  him 
and  given  him  a  name  which  is  above  every  name,  that  at  the 
name  of  Jesus  every  knee  should  bow  and  that  every  tongue 
should  confess  that  Jesus  Christ  is  Lord  (Master)  to  the  glory 
of  God  the  Father"  (Phil.  2:9-11). 

Does  some  one  say  that  we  have  only  the  record  of  his  life 
given  by  his  friends?  We  have  one  thing  more  —  the  eloquent 
silence  of  his  enemies.  Silent  they  must  be,  or  Rabbi  Hirsh 
would  not  have  called  him,  "The  greatest  prophet  ever  born 
of  woman." 

Was  Jesus  a  madman?  There  have  been  insane  enthusiasts 
who  have  fancied  themselves  the  vicegerents  of  the  Almighty. 

281 


282  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

Invariably  such  men  show  certain  well  understood  charac- 
teristics, (i)  They  lack  self  control.  Jesus  was  self  poised. 
Nothing  ever  disturbed  the  calm  equanimity  of  that  serene 
soul.  (2)  Such  persons  invariably  reveal  the  fact  that  down 
deep  in  their  hearts  they  are  swayed  by  the  ordinary  motives 
of  greed  or  ambition.  Peter  the  Hermit,  Swedenborg,  Joseph 
Smith,  Madam  Blavatsky,  John  Alexander  Dowie,  and  Mary 
Baker  Eddy  are  examples.  Of  Jesus:  "No  guile  was  found 
in  his  mouth."  So  far  as  known  to  this  writer  in  every  case 
of  men  assuming  the  place  of  religious  leaders  under  a  craze  of 
enthusiasm  there  has  been  some  method  pursued  contributing 
to  the  gratification  of  their  own  passions  or  to  the  satisfaction 
of  their  ambition  and  love  of  distinction  in  the  present  life. 
There  arose  among  the  Jews  many  pretenders  to  Messiah- 
ship,  who  invariably  aimed  at  securing  for  themselves  the 
throne  of  Israel.  The  conduct  of  Jesus  was  such  that  no 
one  ever  found  in  him  a  single  trace  of  sordidness  or  worldly 
ambition.  His  character  in  this  respect  was  so  clear  that 
Pilate  believed  him  when  he  said,  "My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world." 

But  the  hypothesis  of  fraud  or  delusion  in  Jesus  done  is 
inadequate  as  an  explanation  of  the  phenomena  of  the  origin 
of  Christianity.  No  hypothesis  is  adequate  which  does  not 
explain  how  the  disciples  of  Jesus  came  to  declare  with  such 
persistence  and  insistence  that  he  had  risen  from  the  dead. 
The  bodies  of  impostors  and  madmen  lie  in  their  graves  as 
quietly  as  those  of  sane  and  virtuous  men  and  women.  Unless 
the  disciples  conspired  to  perpetrate  a  fraud,  or  were  all  victims 
of  the  same  delusion  of  the  senses,  there  was  some  external 
reality  at  the  foundation  of  their  assertions.  They  everywhere 
affirmed  that  to  their  certain  knowledge  he  had  risen  from  the 
dead,  and  we  must,  if  possible,  find  some  rational  explanation 
of  that  testimony.  How  did  they  come  to  say  with  such 
confidence  and  with  such  unanimity  that  "this  Jesus  hath 
God  raised  up  whereof  we  are  witnesses"? 

Two  hypotheses  are  suggested  to  account  for  the  testimony 
of  the  disciples  to  the  fact  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  (i)  That 


WAS  JESUS  AN  IMPOSTOR  OR  A  MADMAN?  283 

the  disciples  were  the  victims  of  a  delusion  of  the  senses. 
(2)  That  they  conspired  to  fabricate  the  story  and  to  tell  it.* 

*The  writer  once  heard  a  disciple  of  the  school  of  "modern  thought" 
and  "culture"  set  forth  what  may  seem  a  third  hypothesis,  viz.  that  the 
disciples,  in  their  preaching,  really  used  the  words  ascribed  to  them  in  the 
Gospels,  but  that  their  utterances  were  not  intended  to  be  taken  literally; 
that  we  are  not  to  understand  that  there  was  any  physical  resurrection  at 
all,  and  that  the  disciples  of  Jesus  did  not  expect  to  be  so  understood; 
that  they  only  meant  that  the  spirit  of  Jesus  was  exalted  and  was  hence- 
forth to  be  exhibited  in  their  lives.  Oh!  for  another  Dickens,  to  show 
us  that  these  men,  when  they  said  "This  Jesus  hath  God  raised  up  whereof 
we  are  witnesses"  only  intended  that  their  utterances  should  be  taken  in  a 
"Pickwickian  sense."  If  that  were  their  purpose,  as  honest  men  they  could 
not  have  used  the  words  they  did.  No  sane  man  could  use  the  words 
imputed  to  them  and  not  expect  that  his  auditors  would  understand  him 
in  the  ordinary  acceptation  of  the  terms.  Festus  took  the  only  rational 
view  of  the  matter,  when  he  said  of  the  Jew's  controversy  with  Paul  that  it 
related  to  "one  Jesus  who  was  dead  whom  Paul  affirmed  to  be  alive."  If 
in  their  hearts  they  did  not  believe  him  risen  as  their  words  imply,  they  can 
not  escape  from  a  just  imputation  of  fraud. 


CHAPTER  XX 

WERE  THE  DISCIPLES  OF  JESUS  DELUDED 
ENTHUSIASTS? 

WE  frankly  admit  that  in  attempting  to  account  for  the  origin 
of  Christianity,  by  supposing  its  first  devotees  to  have  been 
such  persons  as  above  indicated,  the  enemies  of  Christianity 
have  offered  what  at  first  glance  seems  a  plausible  and  natural 
explanation  of  the  supposed  supernatural  events.  Given  a 
man  of  such  character  as  it  is  conceded  that  Jesus  was;  given 
an  age  when  earth  and  air  and  sea  were  peopled  with  ghosts 
and  goblins;  when  a  credulous  multitude  were  easily  led  to 
believe  in  the  supernatural  power  of  a  hero;  when  even  the 
best  informed  men  had  not  conceived  the  course  of  nature  to 
be  otherwise  than  irregular  and  capricious;  given  a  multitude 
of  sick  and  suffering  humanity  seeking  relief  from  physical 
suffering,  and  you  have  the  conditions  for  the  development  of 
wonderful  stories  of  supernatural  power.  We  are  sometimes 
told  that  at  the  present  time  there  is  an  analogous  case  in 
the  credulity  of  large  numbers  of  men  manifesting  their  belief 
in  various  superstitions.  Not  very  long  ago  in  Europe  the 
palace  doors  of  royalty  were  crowded  with  multitudes  of 
suffering  men  and  women  waiting  for  the  healing  touch 
of  the  king.  All  over  Europe  one  locality  vied  with  another 
in  its  claims  for  the  supernatural  power  of  certain  springs  of 
water.  Even  now  many  sincere  people  assert  their  belief  in 
the  healing  virtue  of  certain  prayers,  of  imposition  of  hands, 
and  of  sundry  anointings.  It  seems  a  natural  thing  to  say 
that  Jesus  could  not  withold  the  tender  word  and  touch  of 
sympathy,  and  that  then,  as  now,  the  springing  up  of  a  great 
new  hope  wrought  marvels.  And  the  loving  and  credulous 
disciples  were  deluded  into  thinking  that  their  master  had 

284 


WERE  THE  DISCIPLES  DELUDED?  285 

indeed  wrought  the  cures.  How  easily  we  have  disposed  of 
the  whole  matter! 

Now  were  there  no  testimony  to  any  other  command  over 
nature  than  that  manifested  in  the  cure  of  disease,  convincing 
as  that  may  have  been  at  the  time,  we  would  probably  be 
found  among  the  doubting  Thomases  to-day.  And  yet  it  is 
in  order  to  observe  that  there  are  several  striking  differences 
between  the  cures  ascribed  to  Jesus  and  those  claimed  for 
other  and  modern  healers :  (i)  There  are  no  tentative  miracles. 
It  has  never  been  claimed,  not  even  by  the  Jews  of  the 
time,  that  Jesus  ever  attempted  to  work  a  cure  and  failed. 
(2)  There  appears  to  be  no  limit  to  the  classes  of  cases  on 
which  His  power  is  exerted  and  (3)  His  cures  are  instantaneous. 

If  the  disciples  were  deluded  in  their  belief  as  to  what 
Jesus  did  —  if  their  stories  were  concocted  under  the  feverish 
heat  of  an  overworked  imagination,  there  is  one  circumstance 
that  is  certainly  strange:  in  no  case  is  Jesus  reported  to  have 
used  his  supernatural  power  for  his  own  ease  or  personal 
advantage.  That  fact  accords  well  with  what  the  coolest 
criticism  would  say  we  should  expect  from  such  a  character 
as  Jesus  is  believed  to  have  been.  But  it  is  well  nigh  incon- 
ceivable that  feverish  brains  should  have  been  so  discreet  in 
their  portrayal  of  him.  In  the  Apochryphal  Gospels, —  those 
fictions  of  the  later  centuries, — the  minds  of  the  authors  fairly 
revel  in  the  invention  of  marvelous  stories  in  which  Jesus  is 
represented  as  working  wonderful  deeds  for  his  own  con- 
venience or  fame.  Now  on  the  hypothesis  of  delusion,  what 
set  the  bounds  to  the  imagination  of  the  Gospel  writers? 
Deluded  people  always  have  active  imaginations,  and  it  is 
passing  strange  that  some  of  the  disciples  did  not  think  that 
they  saw  Jesus  himself  feeding  on  bread  miraculously  let 
down  from  heaven,  or  gliding  gracefully  down  through  the 
air  from  a  pinnacle  of  the  temple,  and  so  winning  the  applause 
of  assembled  thousands.  We  are  constrained  to  believe  that 
their  fancy  was  curbed  by  the  walls  of  solid  fact  and  that  the 
story  we  have  of  each  of  the  miracles  of  Jesus  corresponds  to 
an  objective  reality. 


286  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

But  the  miracles  of  Jesus  are  not  confined  to  the  curing  of 
disease.  He  stills  the  tempest  and  he  feeds  the  multitude 
with  five  loaves  and  two  fishes.  Even  here  the  critics  are 
ready  with  explanations  which  do  not  explain.  Storms  do 
sometimes  suddenly  subside,  and  this  was  simply  a  "coinci- 
dence." Exactly,  and  the  coincidence  is  just  what  needs  to 
be  explained.  The  most  natural  explanation  is  power  in  the 
one  at  whose  command  "immediately  the  wind  ceased."  In 
the  feeding  the  multitude  we  have  something  which  baffles 
explanation  except  by  supposing  a  still  greater  marvel.  It 
has  been  suggested  that  in  this  case  the  power  was  exerted,  not 
on  any  material  thing,  but  on  the  appetites  of  the  people. 
But  the  power  to  so  hypnotize  five  thousand  hungry  men  at  once, 
so  that  each  would  believe  himself  nourished,  would  be  as 
great  a  departure  from  the  ordinary  operation  of  "natural 
law,"  as  the  gathering  in  half  an  hour  of  the  everywhere 
abundant  chemical  elements  which  enter  into  the  composition 
of  human  food.  We  often  need  to  guard  ourselves  against 
the  logical  fallacy  of  begging  the  question.  Against  the 
reputed  feeding  of  the  multitude  some  one  urges  "I  cannot 
believe  it  because  it  is  unreasonable  that  any  one  should  do 
such  a  thing."  But  if  the  thing  in  proof  of  which  the  fact  is 
adduced  is  true;  if  Jesus  is  in  fact  "God  with  us,"  the  thing 
claimed  to  be  done  is  no  longer  unreasonable.  Suppose  that 
when,  according  to  the  story,  the  stranger  claiming  the  rights 
of  Ulysses  had  proven  his  identity  by  bending  the  bow  of 
Ulysses,  some  one  had  greeted  the  report  with  "We  cannot 
believe  your  story  because  it  is  unreasonable  that  any  one 
could  bend  that  bow."  In  each  case  the  question  is  one  of 
fact.  Did  the  stranger  bend  the  bow?  Did  the  loaves  and 
fishes  grow?  But  some  one  says,  "The  disciples  may  have 
been  deluded.  Their  highly  wrought  imaginations  may  have 
led  them  to  fancy  all  of  this  when  in  fact  it  was  not  true."  No, 
except  in  the  dream  world  men  do  not  image  unreal  events 
with  such  particularity  and  minuteness  of  detail  as  we  find 
in  the  record  of  this  event.  Let  a  man  to-day  tell  me  such  a 
story.  I  will  say:  "You  are  crazy."  Let  a  dozen  men 


WERE  THE   DISCIPLES  DELUDED?  287 

bear  witness  to  it,  and  unless  I  believe  them  I  will  say  "  Gentle- 
men, you  may  be  lying  but  you  cannot  be  mistaken." 

But  as  some  one  has  said,  "Sooner  or  later  we  come  to 
Joseph's  tomb."  Hence  we  will  spend  no  further  time  on 
events  in  the  ministry  of  Jesus,  but  will  ask  at  once:  "Was 
the  testimony  of  the  disciples  to  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  due 
to  an  hallucination?"  This  has  seemed  to  some  the  most 
plausible  solution  of  the  difficulty.  We  frankly  concede  that 
prior  to  investigation  there  is  a  very  strong  presumption 
against  the  truth  of  such  a  story  as  the  disciples  of  Jesus  went 
forth  proclaiming.  That  a  human  body,  pronounced  dead 
on  Friday  evening,  but  more  surely  made  dead  by  a  spear 
thrust  to  the  heart,  laid  in  a  tomb,  sealed  with  the  seal  of  the 
Roman  governor,  guarded  by  a  watch  of  trained  soldiers, — 
that  this  body,  on  the  Sunday  following,  and  at  sundry  times 
for  forty  days  thereafter,  should  be  found  walking  abroad, 
entering  rooms,  sitting  at  table,  eating,  and  giving  food  for 
others  to  eat,  and  engaging  in  conversation  —  indeed,  this 
would  seem  a  story,  large  enough,  ordinarily,  to  stagger  the 
credulity  of  the  most  credulous.  It  will  require  tremendous 
proofs  to  make  it  credible.  We  need  not  think  it  strange  that 
many  have  attempted  to  account  for  the  Apostles'  story  on 
the  theory  of  hallucination.  There  are  such  things  as  halluci- 
nations. The  author's  own  investigations,  as  well  as  the 
reports  of  various  societies  of  psychical  research,  lead  him  to 
believe  that  about  one  person  in  ten  has  had  more  or  less 
experience  with  them.  Every  one  is  aware  of  the  occurrence 
of  hallucinations  in  connection  with  illness,  but  in  the  phe- 
nomenon we  are  to  consider,  the  hallucination  is  itself  the 
only  symptom  of  disease.  Hallucination  has  been  denned  as 
"a  subjective  sensory  image  which  arises,  without  external 
stimuli,  is  projected  outward  and  thus  assumes  apparent 
objective  reality."  It  is  to  be  clearly  distinguished  from  the 
dream  state.  The  individual  knows  himself  awake.  There 
are  certain  general  observations  to  be  made  regarding  halluci- 
nations: (i)  They  occur  more  frequently  with  some  senses 
than  with  others.  Visual  and  auditory  hallucinations  are 


288  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

more  frequent  than  those  of  the  other  senses.  Tactile  halluci- 
nations occur  with  only  about  one-tenth  the  frequency  of 
those  of  either  sight  or  hearing. 

(2)  It  is  comparatively  seldom  that  more  than  one  sense 
is  involved  in  a  single  hallucination.    The  subject  hears  a 
voice  but  sees  no  one,  or  he  sees  a  pointing,  beckoning  form 
but  hears  no  sound.    If  the  visual  image  does  not  vanish 
before  the  test  of  the  sense  of  touch  it  is  believed  clear  that 
the  experience  was  not  a  hallucination. 

(3)  It  is  seldom  that  more  than  one  person  is  the  subject 
of  the  same  hallucination  at  the  same  time.    The  probability 
that  there  is  an  objective  reality,  instead  of  a  subjective  image, 
increases  with  every  addition  to  the  company  of  persons  sup- 
posed to  be  hallucinated.    Let  us  examine  the  accounts  given 
by  the  disciples,  of  the  appearances  of  Jesus  to  them.    Let 
the  reader  at  this  point  turn  to  Matt.  27:62  to  28:20,  Mark 
15:42  to  16:20,  Luke  23:50  to  24:48  and  John  19:38  to  21-20, 
also  I  Cor.  15:1-8.    These  accounts  are  sufficiently  divergent  to 
preclude  the  suspicion  of  collusion.    The  writers  record  differ- 
ent appearances  of  Jesus  not  inconsistent  with  each  other. 
It  is  a  mark  of  the  honesty  of  the  disciples  that  no  one  pro- 
fesses to  have  been  at  the  tomb  and  to  have  seen  Jesus  emerge 
from  it.     (A  fabricator  would  have  made  a  better  story  by  so 
reporting.)    All  agree  that  women  were  first  at  the  sepulchre, 
found  it  empty  and  brought  the  disciples  word. 

In  the  accounts  referred  to,  it  will  be  observed  that,  as 
against  the  usual  phenomena  of  hallucination  we  have  (i)  Sev- 
eral persons  with  the  same  hallucination  at  the  same  time. 
That  I  should  have  a  visual  hallucination  is  not  strange.  That 
you  should  have  another  and  different  one  is  not  strange.  It 
is  strange  that  eleven  men  selected  at  random  should  all  be 
victims  of  hallucination.  Strange  that  Jesus  should  have 
selected  eleven  wild-eyed  men  for  his  Apostles;  more  strange 
still  that  any  two  or  all  of  them  should  have  the  same  delusion 
at  once.  Moreover  there  are  two  disciples,  not  Apostles  who 
see  him  together  at  Emmaus.  They  return  to  Jerusalem  and 
find  ten  Apostles  (Thomas  not  being  with  them)  and  there 


WERE  THE  DISCIPLES  DELUDED?  289 

they  all  see  the  same  "apparition"  again.  (2)  The  apparition 
is  persistent  and  recurrent.  It  is  not  a  single  appearance. 
Whatever  this  object  may  be  it  comes  before  them  several 
times  and  in  unexpected  places.  It  is  not  a  passing  fleeting 
vision,  it  abides  before  them  for  a  considerable  time. 

There  is  one  circumstance  in  this  connection  sometimes 
made  the  subject  of  criticism  which  has  a  bearing  on  the  ques- 
tion of  the  delusion  of  these  witnesses.  Was  it  not  strange, 
we  are  asked,  that  these  disciples  on  some  occasions  were  so 
slow  to  recognize  Jesus  if  it  were  really  He?  Not  strange  at 
all.  Most  of  us  have  had  the  experience  of  a  tardy  recognition 
of  a  friend  if  met  in  an  unexpected  place  and  at  an  unexpected 
time.  Such  occasions  will  furnish  enough  instances  of  tardiness 
of  recognition  to  destroy  utterly  the  force  of  any  objection  to 
the  Apostles'  story  based  on  such  tardiness  of  perception.  It 
will  be  observed  also  that  in  such  experiences  the  vividness 
and  certainty  of  identification  was  finally  much  enhanced  by 
the  previous  tardiness  of  recognition.  Further,  this  slowness 
of  perception  is  found,  we  believe,  only  in  the  real  world. 
There  will  be  found  in  the  realm  of  hallucination  few,  if  any, 
examples  of  the  projected  sensory  image  coming  slowly  to  the 
subject's  apprehension,  or  of  its  changing  its  identity  while 
it  remains  in  his  consciousness. 

3.  The  hallucination,  if  such  it  was,  was  simultaneously  of 
sight  and  hearing  and  touch.  They  not  only  see  a  familiar 
form  but  that  form  speaks.  Not  that  alone  but  they  try  the 
sense  of  touch.  '  Anticipating  the  New  Psychology  by  eighteen 
centuries,  this  apparition  says:  "Handle  me  and  see."  "Have 
you  any  meat?"  And  then  they  take  a  "piece  of  a  broiled  fish 
and  a  honeycomb,"  and  approach  this  shadowy  form,  this 
speaking  "figment  of  the  imagination,"  this  "subjective  sensory 
image"  projected  out  there  in  space.  And  they  tell  us  that 
this  spectre,  or  whatever  it  is  called,  takes  the  fish  and  the 
honeycomb,  and  eats  before  them.  On  another  occasion  he 
prepares  a  meal  for  them,  and  before  their  eyes  takes  the 
provisions  and  distributes  to  them.  They  state  too  that  the 
sceptic  among  them  was  convinced  by  the  challenge  to  thrust 


290  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

his  finger  into  the  scar  of  the  nails  in  his  hands,  and  his  hand 
into  the  scar  of  the  spear  thrust  in  his  side. 

Think  of  the  dimensions  of  this  delusion  if  such  it  was. 
That  such  a  hallucination  should  be  so  general  and  persistent 
and  of  frequent  recurrence,  and  of  so  many  senses,  would  be 
as  great  a  marvel  as  that  for  which  we  are  trying  to  account. 
There  is  certainly  some  objective  reality  in  any  case  where  so 
many  men  believe  they  see  something  with  such  particu- 
larity. Only  the  man  who  has  prejudged  the  case  and  said 
that  such  a  thing  as  the  resurrection  could  not  be  proven  by 
any  amount  of  evidence  —  only  such  a  man  will  insist  that 
the  disciples  of  Jesus  were  deluded.  If  Jesus  did  not  really 
stand  before  them,  they  knew  they  were  lying  every  time 
they  afterward  opened  their  mouths  to  say:  "This  Jesus 
hath  God  raised  up  whereof  we  are  witnesses."* 

*A  few  years  after  the  murder  of  President  McKinley,  a  critic  asked 
the  author  whether  an  individual  reporting  the  appearance  to  himself 
of  McKinley  would  be  believed.  He  certainly  would  not  and  should 
not  be.  There  was  an  error  in  thinking  that  he  had  supposed  a  case  at 
all  similar.  It  lacks  a  most  important  element  to  make  it  at  all  parallel 
the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus.  There  is  not  supposed  any  great 
moral  purpose  back  of  it  —  no  foreseen  great  beneficent  end  to  be  accom- 
plished to  justify  the  author  of  nature  in  thus  departing  from  his  estab- 
lished order.  But  the  supposed  case  may  be  so  stated  that  its  treatment  by 
rational  men  may  throw  some  light,  not  on  the  direct  question  of  the  cred- 
ibility of  the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus,  but  on  the  question  we 
are  in  fact  discussing,  viz.,  that  of  the  hallucination  of  the  disciples  at 
sundry  times  for  forty  days  after  the  death  of  Jesus.  Suppose  I  say  to 
you:  "Last  evening  just  as  I  was  preparing  for  supper  my  door  bell 
rang.  I  opened  the  door  and  found  a  sad  eyed  and  weary  stranger  there. 
At  my  invitation  he  entered  and  sat  down.  We  were  soon  engaged  in 
the  discussion  of  the  political  situation  of  the  country  and  the  conversation 
turned  upon  the  case  of  Senator  Smoot,  now  being  investigated  by  the 
United  States  Senate.  I  was  charmed  with  the  manner  in  which  he 
expounded  the  constitutional  provisions  applicable  to  the  election  of 
Senators.  I  was  thrilled  while  he  spoke  of  the  charms  and  sanctity  of 
the  American  home,  and  I  admired  the  wisdom  of  his  suggestion  that 
the  whole  matter  might  safely  be  left  to  the  discretion  of  the  committee  of 
the  Senate  having  it  in  charge.  With  something  of  a  tremor  in  his  voice 
he  said  'Don't  hurt  him;  let  the  law  take  its  course.'  Just  then  supper 
was  announced.  I  invited  him  to  sit  down  which  he  did,  and  before  I 
could  return  thanks  he  did  so  himself.  As  he  spoke  with  uplifted  eyes 
I  recognized  the  murdered  president,  and  began  to  inquire  about  the  last 
'voyage  of  the  House  Boat  on  the  Styx.'  'Look  here,'  he  said,  'what 


WERE  THE   DISCIPLES   DELUDED?  291 

do  you  take  me  for?  Do  you  think  that  I  am  a  ghost?  Look  in  my  eyes 
and  see  me.'  Then  he  stretched  out  that  long  arm  of  his  and  grabbed 
my  hand  and  said:  'Shake  hands  and  know  that  it  is  I  myself;  a  ghost 
has  not  flesh  and  bones  and  fingers  as  you  see  me  have.'  Then  he  lifted 
up  his  vest  and  showed  me  the  wound  made  by  the  bullet  of  Czolgosz,  and 
the  long  gash  made  by  the  surgeon's  knife.  Just  then  my  wife  brought 
in  the  coffee.  He  took  the  cup  but  declined  to  drink,  passing  the  cup  to 
me.  He  asked  for  a  glass  of  water  which  I  gave  him  and  he  drank.  Last 
of  all  he  rose  and  said  that  he  hoped  I  would  make  all  the  votes  I  could 
for  Roosevelt  and  Protection.  With  that  he  vanished  out  of  the  door 
and  I  have  seen  him  no  more." 

Now,  of  course,  no  one  would  believe  my  story.  My  telling  it  with 
such  particularity  does  not  show  the  story  true,  but  my  repeating  it  with 
such  minuteness  of  detail  does  have  an  important  bearing  on  the  explanation 
of  my  telling  it.  My  telling  the  story  is  a  fact  to  be  accounted  for  in  some 
manner.  Had  I  only  asserted  without  amplification  "I  saw  President 
McKinley  last  night,"  you  might  find  the  theory  of  hallucination  adequate. 
Not  so  when  I  relate  my  experience  with  such  circumstantiality.  It  is 
not  a  sudden  and  vanishing  apparition.  I  cannot  if  confronted  with 
some  inconsistency  in  my  story  find  a  way  out  of  it  by  saying:  "The 
time  was  so  short  I  really  could  not  be  certain  what  it  was  that  I  saw." 
By  my  own  statement  the  apparition  was  before  me  for  a  time,  during 
which  I  was  uncertain  as  to  who  it  might  be;  then  on  rationally  appre- 
hended grounds  I  pass  to  a  condition  of  conscious  certainty.  The  halluci- 
nation, if  such  it  was,  was  of  the  senses  of  sight,  hearing,  touch,  and  of 
muscular  movement.  The  projected  sensory  image  is  at  each  moment 
subjected  to  a  new  test,  and  liable  to  be  shown  to  be  the  "baseless  fabric 
of  a  vision."  No  one  will  think  me  simply  a  deluded  Republican  fanatic. 
My  story  will  not  be  believed  and  no  one  will  believe  that  I  believe  it 
myself.  Various  motives  may  be  assigned  for  my  telling  it,  as  love  of 
sport,  joking,  or  of  scientific  experiment.  In  any  case  it  will  be  said  that 
I  had  consciously  manufactured  the  story.  I  may  have  lied;  I  could 
not  have  been  hallucinated. 

Now  the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  goes  beyond  this  in  that 
you  have  to  account  for  the  identical  hallucination  ofat  least  two  women  (Matt. 
28.1)  and  thirteen  men.  For  aught  we  have  seen  so  far  they  may  have 
conspired  to  tell  a  lie.  What  may  be  the  probability  of  their  doing  so 
will  be  considered  in  the  next  chapter 


CHAPTER  XXI 
WERE   THE   APOSTLES   OF   JESUS   IMPOSTORS? 

ONE  by  one  the  several  schemes  which  would  account  for 
Christianity  on  the  supposition  of  its  falsity  have  been  con- 
sidered. We  have  seen  that  no  one  maintains  that  Jesus 
Himself  was  an  impostor.  That  the  supposition  of  His  being 
a  madman  is  inadequate.  We  have  seen  that  the  present 
Gospel  story,  by  successive  steps,  can  be  traced  back  to  those 
who  received  it  from  the  Apostles  themselves.  We  have 
found  that  this  story  is  not  a  myth,  neither  is  it  a  forgery 
nor  an  accretion  of  legendary  materials.  It  is  the  account 
which  the  first  disciples  of  Jesus  gave  as  the  ground  of  their 
faith  in  the  Christian  system.  We  have  seen  that  the  sup- 
position that  the  disciples  of  Jesus  were  hallucinated  is  unten- 
able. One  hypothesis  alone  remains  to  be  considered.  Did 
the  Apostles  manufacture  the  story  of  the  life  and  ministry 
of  Jesus,  including  the  account  of  His  death  and  resurrection, 
as  told  in  the  four  Gospels?  It  is  to  be  said  at  the  beginning 
that  if  so  they  were  a  wonderfully  successful  set  of  fabricators 
with  a  very  unskilfully  made  fabrication.  As  a  fabrication, 
the  Gospel  story  as  we  have  it  would  be  subject  to  overthrow 
from  either  of  several  sources  of  difficulty:  (i)  The  dimen- 
sions of  the  story  are  too  great,  and  it  is  exposed  to  contradiction 
at  so  many  points.  The  Apostles  go  everywhere  preaching 
in  the  very  country  in  which  they  claim  that  Jesus  wrought 
His  miracles.  They  run  the  risk  of  having  some  one  retort: 
"I  was  living  here  at  that  time  and  I  never  heard  of  it."  They 
proclaim  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  in  the  very  face  of  those 
who  had  cried  "crucify  him."  (2)  As  fabricators  they  exposed 
their  scheme  to  great  risk  in  the  number  of  persons  who  must 
have  been  taken  into  their  secret.  Their  plan,  if  fraudulent, 
involves  the  keeping  of  a  great  secret.  Where  was  the  body 

292 


WERE  THE  APOSTLES  IMPOSTORS?          293 

of  Jesus?  One  thing  is  certain:  the  enemies  of  Jesus  have 
lost  His  body.  Had  they  had  it  when  the  disciples  began 
preaching  the  resurrection,  they  would  have  produced  it. 
That  they  did  not  do  so  is  conclusive  evidence  that  they  could 
not.  They  did  not  know  where  it  was.  If  the  disciples,  as 
was  charged,  had  stolen  it  away,  and  disposed  of  it  in  order 
that  they  might  afterward  say  "He  is  risen,"  what  a  fearful 
secret  they  had  to  guard.  And  at  least  eleven  men  and 
three  women,  whose  names  we  know,  must  have  been  in  that 
conspiracy  (Luke  24.10). 

But  when  we  attempt  to  account  for  the  origin  of  Chris- 
tianity on  the  hypothesis  of  fraud  committed  by  the  disciples 
of  Jesus,  we  are  met  with  the  difficulty  of  finding  a  motive 
for  the  perpetration  of  such  a  fraud.  On  our  present  hypothesis 
the  whole  account,  notably  that  of  the  resurrection,  is  a  stu- 
pendous falsehood.  Now  there  is  no  general  rule  which  holds 
true  with  fewer  exceptions  than  this:  men  who  make  lies 
and  try  to  have  them  believed  by  their  fellows  have  a  motive 
for  so  doing.  You  may  find  a  man  who  will  make  and  tell 
lies  for  the  love  of  it,  but  such  men  are  rare.  From  Cain  to 
Ananias,  and  from  Ananias  to  Titus  Oats,  we  may  ask: 
Does  a  man  tell  lies  for  nought?  Our  whole  system  of  juris- 
prudence assumes  that  ordinary  men  prefer  to  tell  the  truth, 
and  will  tell  the  truth  in  the  absence  of  a  motive  to  the  con- 
trary. Among  all  the  motives  which  ordinarily  move  men  to 
falsehood  not  one  of  them  can  be  found  operative  in  this  case. 
There  was  no  money,  nor  ease,  nor  honor,  nor  reputation 
in  it.  All  accounts  agree  that  Jesus  held  out  no  promise  of 
any  of  these  things  to  His  disciples.  If  it  be  said  that  they 
had  the  hope  of  eternal  bliss,  which  is  a  powerful  motive  in 
the  lives  of  many  men,  we  answer,  that  their  whole  hope  of 
future  happiness  rested  on  the  promise  of  Jesus  who  had 
failed  to  save  Himself  from  His  enemies,  and  whose  decaying 
body,  on  our  present  hypothesis,  they  had  stolen  and  disposed  of. 
Further,  by  the  very  terms  of  the  doctrine  they  preached  to 
others,  they  would  cut  themselves  off  from  all  hope  of  future 
bliss  by  making  and  telling  this  story.  If  Peter  and  John 


294  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

had  a  part  in  bearing  away  the  body  of  Jesus,  there  is  some- 
thing fearfully  grotesque  in  Peter  upbraiding  Ananias  with 
his  falsehood,  and  in  John  writing  that  "all  liars  shall  have 
their  part  in  the  lake  that  burneth  with  fire  and  brimstone." 
The  hope  of  future  bliss  would,  indeed,  be  a  powerful  motive 
if  they  believed  their  story  true,  but  it  loses  all  its  force  as 
soon  as  we  suppose  them  engaged  in  the  perpetration  of  a 
fraud.  Is  it  urged  that  the  hope  of  reward  has  moved  many 
men  to  intense  effort  and  sacrifice  for  political,  philosophical, 
or  religious  doctrines,  which  we  all  know  now  to  be  false? 
We  answer:  those  devotees  believed  them  true.  Christianity 
might,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  be  utterly  false,  and  yet  the  hope 
of  the  rewards  it  promises  to  the  faithful  sustain  one  in  suffer- 
ing a  martyr's  death  for  it,  since  he  believed  it  true.  But  if 
Christianity  is  false,  Peter  and  John  knew  it  was  false,  and 
every  time  they  opened  their  mouths  to  say  "Him  hath  God 
raised  up"  they  knew  they  were  lying. 

In  short  there  seems  to  be  an  utter  absence  of  each  and 
every  one  of  the  motives  which  ordinarily  move  men  to  activity 
in  fraudulent  schemes.  No  one  ever  accused  the  Apostles  of 
Jesus  of  an  effort  (as  we  say  of  some  political  leaders)  "to 
feather  their  own  nests."  That  the  enemies  of  Christianity 
have  not  preserved  such  a  charge  against  them  is  sufficient 
for  thinking  that  the  charge  was  never  made,  and  we  are  left 
free  to  believe,  as  Luke  relates,  that  they  even  declined  the 
responsibilities  which  might  have  afforded  them  the  oppor- 
tunity of  dishonest  gain  (Acts  6.1-5).  Neither  is  there  any 
evidence  that  the  Apostles  attempted  to  exploit  their  authority 
over  the  churches  which  they  founded  so  as  to  gratify  that 
miserable  motive  of  sinful  humanity,  the  desire  of  holding 
office. 

But  not  only  is  there  an  absence  of  adequate  motive  for 
making  and  telling  such  a  story  if  it  were  false,  but  we  can 
plainly  see  that  all  the  motives  which  ordinarily  move  men  to 
activity  would  combine  to  render  the  Apostles  silent.  In 
these  times  when  religious  liberty  is  guaranteed  to  every  one; 
when  a  man  is  secure  in  person  and  property,  no  matter  what 


WERE  THE   APOSTLES   IMPOSTORS?  295 

the  absurdity  of  his  religious  faith,  we  can  possibly  imagine 
a  man  propounding  some  absurd  doctrine  with  no  higher 
motive  than  the  love  of  the  cheap  notoriety  which  it  may 
give  him.  But  not  so  in  those  days.  With  nothing  to  stay 
the  fury  of  those  whose  most  cherished  prejudices  were  antago- 
nized, a  man  was  likely  to  find  his  notoriety  very  dearly  bought. 
Paley  well  puts  the  case  thus:  "There  is  satisfactory  evidence 
that  many  professing  to  be  original  witnesses  of  the  Christian 
miracles  passed  their  lives  in  labors,  dangers,  and  suffering, 
voluntarily  undergone  in  attestation  of  the  accounts  which 
they  delivered  and  solely  in  consequence  of  their  belief  in  these 
accounts;  and  that  they  also  submitted  from  the  same  motives 
to  new  rules  of  conduct."  Our  claim  is  simply  this:  that 
the  dangers  and  sufferings  undergone  prove  the  sincerity  of 
those  undergoing  them.  It  is  common  for  the  critics  of  Chris- 
tianity, to  point  to  the  fact  that  some  devotees  of  some 
utterly  false  and  absurd  religious  or  philosophical  theories 
have  been  willing  to  suffer  and  even  to  die  for  them.  We 
will  grant  to  them  all  that  at  this  point  we  are  claiming  for 
the  Christian  martyrs.  In  each  case  the  sufferings  voluntarily 
undergone  prove  the  sincerity  of  the  sufferer.  The  death  of 
Hypatia  proves  just  what  the  death  of  a  Chinese  martyr 
proves  to-day;  and  in  each  of  these  cases  the  sufferings  under- 
gone prove  just  what  the  sufferings  of  the  Apostolic  martyrs 
proved,  namely,  the  sincerity  of  the  witness.  The  difference 
is  just  this:  the  sincerity  of  one  sufferer  involves  more  than 
the  sincerity  of  the  other.  The  Chinese  Christian,  during  the 
Boxer  outbreak,  underwent  suffering  and  death  in  attestation 
of  his  faith  in  a  story  which  he  had  received  from  others.  It 
may  be  true  or  it  may  be  false  without  at  all  affecting  the 
question  of  his  sincerity.  The  first  Christian  martyrs  died  in 
attestation  of  their  faith  in  a  story  of  events  of  which  they 
claimed  to  be  eye  and  ear  witnesses:  a  story  which,  if  it  were 
not  true,  it  must  be  said  they  knew  it  to  be  false.  We  have 
already  several  times  admitted  that  you  can  find  examples 
of  men  dying  for  a  falsehood  which  they  believed  to  be  true. 
We  do  deny  that  it  is  in  human  nature  for  a  man  to  be  ready 


296  STUDIES  IN  MORAL  SCIENCE 

to  die  for  a  falsehood  which  he  has  told  and  knows  to  be  a  lie. 
But  that  is  just  what  the  Apostles  of  Jesus  did  on  the  hypothesis 
that  they  manufactured  the  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus. 

We  are  not  informed  as  to  the  number  of  those  who  pro- 
fessed to  have  seen  the  risen  Christ.  We  have  Paul's  state- 
ment that  there  were  above  five  hundred  who  saw  him  at  one 
time.  The  writers  of  the  Gospels  evidently  would  not  have 
us  understand  that  his  appearance  was  confined  to  the  Apostles 
and  the  Galilean  women.  But  as  we  have  but  meager  accounts 
of  the  lives  of  most  and  of  only  a  few  know  even  the  names, 
this  discussion  is  confined  to  the  testimony  given  by  those  of 
whose  subsequent  career  or  work  something  is  known.  Of 
the  twelve  Apostles  Judas  committed  suicide.  Of  the  eleven, 
every  one  (with  Paul,  who  is  understood  to  claim  to  be  a 
witness)  spent  the  remainder  of  his  life  in  the  propagation  of 
the  Christian  faith.  They  uniformly  assigned  the  resurrection 
of  Jesus  "whereof  we  are  witnesses"  as  the  ground  of  their 
faith.  They  met  with  ridicule  and  poverty  and  persecution. 
John  alone,  after  a  life  of  great  toil  and  suffering,  is  known  to 
have  died  a  natural  death.  Of  the  others  six  certainly  and 
probably  the  other  four  also  fell  victims  to  the  fury  of  their 
enemies.  The  one  charge  against  them  was  that  they  stirred 
up  the  people  with  matter  relating  to  "one  Jesus  who  was 
dead  whom  they  affirmed  to  be  alive." 

Let  us  consider  what  is  involved  in  the  supposition  of  a 
collusion  on  the  part  of  the  Apostles  to  commit  a  fraud  of  this 
character.  What  a  strange  company  have  here  fallen  together! 
There  are  perhaps  a  few  men  who  will  tell  a  lie  for  five  cents. 
The  number  is  certainly  smaller  who  will  tell  it  for  absolutely 
nothing;  still  smaller  who  would  combine  to  tell  it.  A  still 
smaller  number  —  very  few  indeed  —  would  endure  any  con- 
siderable sacrifice  for  the  sake  of  telling  it;  while  it  is  incon- 
ceivable that  any  one  would  die  a  death  by  torture  rather 
than  quit  telling  it.  But  here  we  have  at  least  ten  men  whose 
names  we  know  who,  with  other  conspirators,  make  a  lie 
apparently  without  any  rational  motive;  they  tell  it  under  all 
the  solemnities  of  courts  of  justice.  They  endure  hardships 


WERE  THE  APOSTLES  IMPOSTORS?          297 

and  privations  and  impose  on  themselves  labors  and  sacrifices 
for  the  sake  of  being  able  to  tell  it.  Undismayed  by  the 
threats  of  their  enemies,  they  persist  in  telling  it;  and  finally 
separated  from  each  other,  in  different  countries,  at  different 
times,  each  of  the  ten,  so  far  as  known,  dies  a  violent  death 
rather  than  quit  telling  a  story  which  he  knew  to  be  a  lie!  And 
these  ten  were  all  found  in  one  group.  All  that  and  more  the 
man  who  asserts  that  the  Apostles  of  Jesus  perpetrated  a 
fraud  must  be  prepared  to  believe.  We  must  think  that  these 
witnesses  believed  the  story  which  they  told.  Christians 
to-day  are  sometimes  accused  of  credulity.  We  submit  that 
the  credulous  people  are  not  all  found  in  the  Christian  church. 
The  church  has  had  some  credulous  people.  It  has  also  had 
its  "doubting  Thomases,"  and  its  intellectually  "stubborn 
Sauls. "  But  the  unbelieving  world  is  more  credulous  than  we. 

The  man  who  can  accept  the  logical  consequences  of 
the  contention  that  the  Apostles  of  Jesus  were  impostors  will 
break  the  record  for  the  ability  to  believe  strange  things  with- 
out evidence. 

We  say  again  that  we  will  ask  no  man  to  believe,  unless 
to  him  as  a  rational  being  it  seems  more  reasonable  to  believe 
than  to  disbelieve.  We  have  our  choice  between  two  marvelous 
things.  On  the  one  hand,  there  is  this  unprecedented  per- 
verseness  of  human  nature  and  adeptness  in  falsehood  with 
no  analogous  case  in  human  history;  on  the  other,  the  belief 
that  a  holy  and  beneficent  Creator  desiring  the  highest  well- 
being  of  the  noblest  of  His  earthly  creatures  —  men  —  has 
chosen  to  reveal  authoritatively  His  will  in  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  has  given  assurance  thereof  to  all  men  by  raising 
Him  from  the  dead. 


CONCLUSION 

To  examine  the  Evidences  of  Christianity  was  in  harmony 
with  the  plan  made  in  the  earlier  part  of  our  work.  Intro- 
ducing the  discussions  of  Practical  Ethics,  noting  the  fields 
where  we  may  look  for  our  inductions,  after  naming  (i)  the 
constitution  physical  and  psychical  of  the  normally  developed 
man;  and  (2)  the  experience  of  men  in  society  we  observed 
that  a  large  number  of  men  believe  that  a  Deity,  supposed 
to  be  beneficent  and  righteous,  has  supplemented  the  knowl- 
edge which  lay  within  the  grasp  of  the  unassisted  human 
understanding,  by  an  authoritative  revelation  of  His  will 
"which,  while  not  the  source  of  Tightness,  might  well  be  thought 
the  proof  of  it."  We  also  said  that  "the  simple  possibility  that 
such  a  revelation  might  be  made  will  lay  every  reasonable 
man  under  obligation  to  consider  attentively  the  genuineness 
and  credibility  of  any  purported  revelation."  The  promise  of 
that  suggestion  we  have  now  fulfilled.  We  are  sure  that 
there  is  no  possibility  that  any  man  who  has  followed  our 
discussion  with  an  earnest  desire  to  know  the  whole  truth 
can  entertain  a  reasonable  doubt  that  Jesus  of  Nazareth  is 
the  authoritative  revelation  of  God  to  men.  From  such  a 
conclusion  there  is  but  one  reasonable  inference:  "  Whatsoever 
He  saith  unto  you  do  it."  We  may  reasonably  expect  that 
the  realization  of  the  principles  that  He  taught  will  compass 
the  whole  field  of  human  duty.  Well  did  Paul  say,  "For 
Christ  is  the  end  of  the  law  for  righteousness  to  every  one 
that  believe th."  Whoever  desires  to  instruct  and  move  men 
to  better  living,  and  for  better  character,  will  do  best  to  set 
before  them  Jesus  Christ,  not  alone  as  the  best  example  of 
the  thoroughly  good  man,  but  as  the  Savior  of  men  from  the 
guilt  and  dominion  of  sin.  We  submit  the  correctness  of  that 
statement  to  the  experience  of  the  race  in  its  ethical  history. 
We  trust  the  reader  has  found  the  study  of  Moral  Science 

298 


CONCLUSION  299 

profitable.  It  is  of  advantage  to  us  that  we  reduce  our  moral 
conceptions  to  some  sort  of  orderly  system.  We  find  satis- 
faction in  "getting  to  the  bottom  of  things";  in  finding  how 
deeply  imbedded  in  universal  human  nature  are  the  facts  of 
our  moral  consciousness.  But  he  who  attempts  to  reform 
men  by  preaching  Moral  Science  is  doomed  to  failure.  It  has 
been  tried.  Socrates  and  Plato  tried  it.  And  "after  that  in 
the  wisdom  of  God  the  world  by  wisdom  knew  not  God  it 
pleased  God  by  the  foolishness  of  preaching  to  save  them 
that  believe."  "For  the  doctrine  of  the  Cross  is  to  them 
that  are  perishing  foolishness,  but  to  us  who  are  being  saved 
it  is  the  power  (dynamic)  of  God." 

We  have  no  apology  to  make  for  suggesting  that  if  any  one 
wishes  to  become  the  best  sort  of  man  possible  for  him  to 
become,  to  realize  in  its  fullness  the  ideal  manhood  that  the 
Creator  wills  for  him;  if  further  he  desires  that  his  life  shall 
count  for  the  most  possible  in  an  effort  to  lift  this  old  world 
a  little  nearer  to  God,  let  him  link  himself  up  with  Jesus  Christ 
in  a  covenant  of  unconditional  self-surrender. 

We  have  occasionally  called  attention  to  the  elevation  of 
individuals  and  communities  under  Christian  teaching.  Much 
has,  indeed,  been  accomplished,  and  yet  Christianity  has  not 
yet  had  a  fair  trial.  Men  have  hardly  dreamed  of  what  would 
occur  if  it  were  generally  and  thoroughly  applied  to  business, 
to  industry,  to  politics,  and  to  our  social  life.  These  fields 
have  been  touched  by  Christianity  in  only  the  most  superficial 
manner.  The  business  of  the  Christian  world  is  still  thoroughly 
pagan  in  its  spirit,  or  at  best  is  only  Christianized  so  far  as 
Christianity  may  coincide  with  worldly  prudence.  Only  a 
few  Christian  men  seem  to  think  of  applying  Christianity  to 
"practical  politics,"  or  to  the  solution  of  civic  or  international 
problems.  And  as  to  social  life,  who  thinks  of  it  as  anything 
but  an  arena  in  which  one  may  gain  applause  or  win  personal 
distinction?  To  follow  out  these  suggestions  and  to  make 
all  our  activities  to  be  permeated  with  a  Christian  altruism 
as  they  are  now  with  egoism,  make  our  whole  lives  as  full  of 
Christ  as  they  now  are  of  "self"  —  that  is  the  problem  of  the 
twentieth  century. 


UNIVEESITY   OF    CALIFORNIA   LIBRAEY, 
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